Those Green Eyes
by fairytalefantasistx3
Summary: It's sixth year, and I, James Potter, vow to make Lily Evans my girlfriend - whatever it takes. And believe me, it takes a lot. LilyxJames with a lot of Marauder Goodness!
1. Prologue

**A/N Hi, this is my first fanfic, hope you like it! I know this is short, but it's only the prologue. They'll get longer, I promise! R&R please!**

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Chapter 1 - Prologue

"Lily!" I shouted down the hallway, last day of fifth year.

"No way, Potter," she sighed without even turning around. Of course, she knew what I was going to ask her. I was going to ask her the thing I had been constantly asking since 3rd year when I discovered that girls weren't icky things with cooties.

Lily Evans. I loved everything about her. The way her hair swished when she walked (admittedly, usually away from me), the way her green eyes lit up when she laughed and her beautiful, mellow voice - which even sounded beautiful to me when she was shouting at me, which seemed to happen a lot. She was just so damn addictive. Every time she turned me down, I came back for more. People must've thought I actually liked rejection. Far from it.

I was quite taken aback at first when she told me where to stick my flowers, back when we were 13. Even back then, I thought I might love her even more than Quidditch. I talked about her literally every minute of the day. I think Sirius and Remus might be a bit fed up of the precise shade of red and the scent of Lily's hair, the way she writes her 'g's with a little flick and how she smiled at me that one time. But then Sirius told me she was smiling at Alice who was walking behind me. Way to burst a bubble Paddy!

I just thought she'd jump at the chance to date me. How wrong I was! I'm _the_ James Potter. No one says no to Potter! I tried to reason with her, tried to tell her why she should say yes. I learnt an important lesson that day. Never try to reason with Evans. That just makes matters even worse. I admit, I was a bit of an arrogant little toe rag back then, but I'm better now! I can sometimes pass Snivellus in the corridor without jinxing him. If that's not maturity, what is?

By the third or fourth time I asked Lily out, I began to get the feeling she wasn't that keen on me. Typical – I love the only girl in the whole freaking school who isn't completely and utterly besotted with me. I tried to tell her how lucky she was that I was asking her out of all the girls in Hogwarts, but that didn't seem to convince her. If anything, it made her even madder. And at the time, I didn't think that was possible.

Now, 3 years later, the situation hasn't changed in the slightest. I love Evans. Evans hates my guts. It's simple really. But that's gonna change this year. I'm 16, and I've matured over the summer. It's August 31st and term starts tomorrow - and James Potter is going to be a changed man. Of course, she'll think I'm up to something. But for the first time in my life, I won't be pranking someone, I won't be joking around. I've just decided that I'm not going to chase Lily Evans any longer. I've got a plan. Now I think about it though, that means I am up to something. Oh well – I knew it was too good to be true.


	2. My Freakish Toes

**A/N Thanks to my 3 reviewers Heffalump Army, XxMidnightWolfxX and Noc007of the first chapter! Reviews are why I want to keep going so pleaseeee R&R! Enjoy the chapter.**

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Chapter 2 - Please Fix My Freakish Toes!

I woke up on September 1st to a beautiful sunny day that matched my mood. Today was the day. I would see Lily again. I'd been deprived all summer of her emerald green eyes I could just sink into, and her gorgeous red hair. Of course, due to the fact that Lily Evans hates me (or she thinks she does) I've never been able to fully appreciate those eyes and that hair. If only she would let me put my arm around her shoulders and bury my head in her hair so I could breathe in the strawberry scent….

"No, James," I muttered to myself as I began to get dressed. "Don't think like that. You have to stick to the plan, the wonderful, fool-proof plan that will make Lily realise that she loves me and has loved me ever since third year."

I'm sure she does love me, deep down in her heart. Of course she does! All the cold words she's spoken to me definitely don't show her true feelings; she just won't admit that I'm the one she wants. Definitely.

I know, I know – maybe, possibly, Lily won't ever have feelings for me however hard I try. Don't think I haven't considered that. I just think that it's highly unlikely. I mean, seriously, how could she not think I'm amazing? I'll be the first to admit that I do have a few faults. Take my toes for example. They're really quite embarrassing, especially the big one on my left foot, which I can't even bare to describe. It sticks out from all the others, like it has a life of it's own. Maybe it's the reason Lily hasn't admitted her feelings yet? I'm sure she must have seen them before when we were in the common room. Oh god James, why don't you ever wear socks? Maybe I can get Remus to fix them. He's pretty good at charms and stuff, as is my sweet Lilyflower. That's what I'll do, as soon as I board the train. Then I'll make sure Lily sees my new and improved toes in the common room tonight.

Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, The Plan. I feel like it deserves capitals, it's so important. Me, Sirius and Remus have been sending letters to each other all through the summer about it. Sirius was all for a love potion, but I think Remus persuaded him against it. He said something about Lily's moral rights I think.

We couldn't brew a love potion even if Remus would let me anyway. That's more Snivelly's area of expertise but I would never ask him for help. Not that he would offer it, even if I offered him some shampoo or something in exchange. I heard Lily (dear, sweet Lily…) talking in the Great Hall last year about this stuff she'd bought that Muggles use for greasy skin like Snape's. It's called clear-it-Phil or something. Stupid name for a product, in my opinion but Muggles do come up with some strange ideas. Take those teevees for example. Sirius told me about those because they were studying them in Muggle Studies. What is the point in those? I must say though, I'm surprised Muggles managed to make pictures move without magic. I hear that in their world, all their paintings and stuff just stay still. Imagine that! They must get really bored just sat in their frames. Also, they wouldn't be able to run away when Sirius and me throw food at their portraits after dinner. We do have pretty good aim though so we usually get them anyway.

I remember once in third year, we were throwing stink bombs from Zonko's at the Slytherins when Lily came around the corner with Snape (I still haven't figured out why the hell she is friends with the greasy bastard). Sirius didn't know about my undying devotion for her at this point, and due to the fact that she was with Snivelly, he levitated a stink bomb and let it splat on her head. I'll never forget her face, and I'm sure Sirius will never forget mine, as well as the Bat-Bogey hex I sent at him. I managed to be angry with him for a week and a half, but then I realised I needed someone to help me with the many pranks I had come up with in our brief period of not talking. He apologised and swore never to cause any harm or discomfort to my beloved Lilykins ever again, whomever she chose to hang around with. I suppose I should think of any one of Lily's friends as my friend, but I just can't bring myself to act friendly towards ol' Snivelly, even for Lily.

I continued to think about Lily as I checked my trunk for all the things I'd need at Hogwarts. I went to Diagon Alley with my parents last week to buy all my new schoolbooks, and a new set of school robes – it seemed I've had a growth spurt since my sixteenth birthday in March. My robes were a good three inches too short and my cauldron was a little chipped so I convinced them to buy me a new one. I got all the usuals of course – parchment, quills, potions ingredients, owl food and broom polish.

I nearly had my father convinced I needed a new broom when we were outside the new Quidditch shop. It's just for brooms, and they had the new Nimbus in the window. It was a Nimbus 1700, and boy it was sleek! It went nought to fifty in five seconds, which is so much better than my Cleansweep 3, which is only nought to thirty in ten seconds! I tried to tell my dad I'd just get laughed at if I brought my old Cleansweep again because all the other kids would have new ones. I knew this would tempt him to buy me one. He doesn't want his boy getting laughed at. That, and the fact that he knew he would get a go on it before I left for Hogwarts. He was as much a sucker for a fast, sleek and sexy broom like me. But then mother got back from Flourish and Blotts and saw us going through the door. She told father in a somewhat stern voice that on no-condition was I getting a new broom, and she had us out of there before you could say chocolate frog.

Not that it matters anyway. I'm still the best chaser Gryffindor has seen to date. It's not only my opinion – the stats speak for themselves. It's a crime I'm still not captain of the team. McGonagall chose that Adam Ferguson. Admittedly, he is a seventh year now and he is a decent player, but he only joined the team last year! I'm a much better chaser, everyone agrees with me, so it really should be me. But I think Minnie doesn't like me much since me and Sirius used a Permenant-Sticking charm to put a huge portrait of Merlin on her wall, then transfigured it so he was wearing one of McGonagall's dresses. Although I'm not sure why she got so mad. At least we didn't use that really silky negligee we found when were sneeking around in her living quaters for something to transfigure Merlins robes into. That thing gave me nightmares for weeks. She still hasn't been able to remove that portrait, but she's put some hangins over it. Merlin still shouts out advice every so often though, when he hears someone doing something though.

I hope Ferguson isn't as much a psycho of a captain as Wood was last year. Now, that boy could _play_ (not as well as me, of course) but when it came to practice he was crazy! Practices on every night he could book the pitch and hour-long tactic talks in the common room on the few nights when he couldn't sweet talk Madame Spedra into reserving it for us. I even have his pre-match speech memorised, but I won't bore you with that. All I will say is that he only stopped when it was time for the match to start and we had to get our butts out of the changing rooms.

I gazed at my broom now at home in my bedroom in a way I could only describe as lovingly. I'd gone through a lot of good times with this broom. I grabbed it, and took it along with my trunk and owl down the stairs. I put them down next to the front door and grabbed my coat. It was past 10 o'clock by now, and I wanted to board the train in plenty of time this year to find the boys and maybe catch a glimpse of Lily as I walked down the train.

"Hurry up," I yelled impatiently to my parents who were in the kitchen. Mother was using her wand to spread jam on my sandwich.

"Strawberry?" I asked hopefully,

"Of course," she replied, smiling at me. She wrapped them in foil and I shoved them in my pocket. I was wearing muggle clothes, as always. I would change on the train as night began to fall and we approached the castle.

I felt a kind of longing as I thought about Hogwarts. It is, and always will be, my second home. As much as I loved coming back to see my parents, I missed the school. I missed the marauders, Lily (obviously), the dorm, the common room, being able to use magic… Hell, I guess I even missed the lesson. Even History of Magic, but I think this was due to the fact that Lily sat directly in front of me.

Thinking about Lily made me even more eager to get going. I pulled my mother and father to the front door, barely giving them time to grab their wands. Mine was in my pocket. I always carried it with me, wherever I was, even though I was only supposed to use it in emergencies during the holidays.

That hadn't stopped me from performing a few completely necessary spells before for, erm, _emergencies_. I was a Marauder at school, and a Marauder at home. That would never change, and I would never want it to. Breaking the rules was a thrill for me and I couldn't wait to get to school to do some of the pranks that had evolved in my mind during the summer!

We half walked, half ran to the gate which was the boundary to our house's enchantments. I grabbed my father's left arm as my mother grabbed on to his right.

"Take it away Dad!"

I felt the familiar sensation of apparition as we squeezed through space to our destination. I realised with a jolt that this was the last year of side-along apparition. Next year, I would have learnt to do this alone. No sooner had I began to imagine the pranking possibilities once all the Marauders could apparate, we had arrived in a dark, dirty alley. This was the place we always apparated to on September 1st, so I already knew where to go next.

I turned left at the end of the alley, looking at my watch with my parents trailing behind. 10:35. I sped up a little, and hurried my parents along.

"Excited, James?" asked my father.

"Oh yes, extremely Dad," I replied, grinning.

"Well don't be getting into too much trouble this year James. I don't want to get an owl from Professor McGonagall before we even get back to the house," my mother said. "Don't be, you know, blowing up toilets or something on the train before you've even got there.

"Wow, Mum! That's a really good idea, thanks! I don't think anyone has ever done that before and I doubt they ever will," I exclaimed with a grin. My mother shook her head with a slight smile I know she tried to disguise. I took a mental note to talk to Sirius about the idea when I saw him.

We hurried along for a couple more minutes and were soon outside Kings Cross Station. I stopped abruptly and turned to my parents.

"I thought we could say our proper goodbyes now, not inside the station with everyone watching. We don't want _someone_ getting all emotional like last year and embarrassing me."

I looked pointedly at my mother when I was saying this, who responded by pulling me into a long hug.

"Be careful Jamesy! I'll miss you," she half sobbed into my shoulder as I held her.

"You know I won't be careful Mum, so why bother? And I'll miss you too," I said, as I did every year. "But please don't call me Jamesy!" I wailed. I permitted her to give me a small kiss on the cheek before I looked at my father.

"I'll miss you as well. Please try to persuade Mum not to send me a howler when I blow up the toilets. She gave me the idea after all, so it is really her fault," I joked as I gave my father a brief hug that didn't crush my bones like ithe one I just received from my mother.

"Of course son."

We carried on into the station, dragging all my stuff between us. We walked over to the barrier and slid nonchalantly through it to the other side. The scarlet red train was sat there as we entered Platform 9 ¾. Students were hanging out of the windows saying their final goodbyes to their parents. I looked at my watch again – 10:55. I hastily hugged my parents again.

"Bye Mum, bye Dad. Love you both."

I waved as I walked over to the steps to board the train.

"Oh Mummykins, I love you so! Bye Father dearest!" said a voice coming down the steps. I got ready to curse whoever it was, underage magic ban or not, but stopped when I saw who the voice had come from.

"Paddy!"

"Hiya Prongsie mate!" he shouted, pulling me into a hug.

I slapped him on the back saying "Good summer?"

"The worst," Sirius replied glumly. "Mother wouldn't stop screaming. I can't tell you how pleased I am to be away from that crappy place at last."

"Ah well," I sympathised. "Maybe you can stay with us next summer? Mum and Dad would be happy to have you stay, you know they love you."

"Of course they do. Who doesn't?" he replied smirking. I forgot how arrogant he can be, it gets so annoying at times. "That'd be cool though," he continued. "We could keep pranking all the way through the summer!"

"Oh yeah, that reminds me! Mother gave me a great idea for a prank. It involves blowing up stuff…"

Sirius grinned. "Sounds inter-" he began, but was cut off by the sound of a loud whistle, indicating it was time to leave.

Sirius helped me drag my trunk, cage and broom up the steps and we began to go down the narrow corridor as the train began to move. I saw Snivelly in one of the compartments we passed, looking greasy as ever. I didn't see Lily at all, and she was hard to miss. I would recognise her fiery head of hair anywhere.

"I've already found Remus and Pete," Sirius panted. It was hard work dragging all my stuff down the train. "They're waiting in the compartment we found before you got here.

After a few minutes, we reached a near empty compartment. The only people in there were two boys.

"Finally James! We thought you'd got lost!"

"Yeah, nice to see you too Remus!" I joked as I sat down. "The Mother got a little emotional again."

They all grinned at me. It was good to be back, all I needed was to see Lily.

"Remus!" I exclaimed. "Before I forget, I have a favour to ask of you."

"Ok, whatever. What is it?"

"Well, you know my big toe…"

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**A/N Well that's it for the second chapter! I know it's still not that long, but I've decided I'm going to write pretty short chapters so I can update quicker. I have a rough idea of where I'm going with this story, but anyone got any little ideas? They'd be appreciated! It won't be too long until the next chapter I hope. R&R please!! I'll give you a cyber-cookie…  
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	3. The Journey

**A/N So, here is the third chapter! I feel like I'm updating pretty fast! Anyway, I have also written a little oneshot about the first time James asked Lily out in third year, called You, Me, Hogsmeade – please R&R that as well if you have the time! I just wrote it when I got a little writer's block with this story.**

**I just want to say thanks to XxMidnightWolfxX who reviewed both chapters and is being really supportive! Reviewers are why I keep going, so please R&R! Enjoy :)**

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Chapter 3 – The Journey

After explaining to Moony about my embarrassing little – well, big and sticky outy, really – problem, he had promised to sort out my big toe as soon as we were in the dormitory.

"But why can't you do it _now _Moony?" I whined. "We're technically at school now, we're on the train, so you can't get into trouble for using a spell!"

"We're not at school! We're on the _transport _that_ leads _to school," he argued, rather annoyingly and smarmily, to my ears.

"Don't be such a nerd! I thought you were a Marauder. What a chicken!" I exclaimed, slyly – calling a Marauder a chicken was a sure way to get them to do whatever you want.

"Don't call me a chicken James! I guess, well, I suppose…. All right, fine I'll do it. Come here before I change my mind."

I grinned at my cunning, and Sirius, who was watching the scene, shook his head silently in amazement at the same trick I'd pulled hundreds of times over the past six years. Remus pulled out his wand carefully, and looked at it saying "But I'm doing this for you James!" as if by saying this, he believed the Improper Use of Magic Office would let him off, if the magic wasn't for him. Yeah, right! Obviously, I didn't want him to get into trouble, but we all have to make sacrifices. Remus had to realise that if he didn't help me straight away, it could seriously jeopardise my chances with Lily. When I told him this however, he only snorted and muttered something I didn't catch into his spell book.

I waited impatiently for about ten minutes, while Moony flicked through his book. When he finally found an appropriate spell, he stabbed the page with his finger.

"Here!" he exclaimed. "Corpus Vicis - a spell to change any part of a human body in any way you please. You just need to cast the spell and imagine how you want the body part to be."

He looked up from the heavy book. "So, I cast it on your big toe and just imagine it as a toe that is absolute perfection?" he snorted, eyebrows raised.

"Yeah!" I said, enthusiastically.

"And what would you say is the 'absolutely perfect' big toe then James?" mocked Sirius.

"You know, just, normal. Like yours!"

"Well, if I do say so myself, _my_ toes are 'absolute perfection'. Would you like me to do the spell on you? I'm pretty good at charms as well, as you know. I'm not sure if Remus would have quite the right idea about perfect toes unless he actually experienced them himself, you know?" he said, working hard to maintain a straight face.

"Hey! What's wrong with my big toe?" asked Remus, pretending to be deeply offended. Great, this was just a huge joke to them both.

"Oh, you know, it's ok. But I'm sure James wants _perfection _not just _ok," _Sirius replied, faking sincerity.

"Yeah, I suppose you're right. Maybe you could do my toe next Padfoot, after James? Of course, mine isn't as much of an emergency case like James', but it's still nice to be 'absolutely perf-"

"GUYS!" I bellowed, cutting him off. Usually, it was Remus who had to cut off mine and Sirius' ramblings, but today it was me getting annoyed, although I admit I had been a little over dramatic.They are only toes after all.

"Yes?" they both replied innocently. "Ready for your surgery, James?" asked Padfoot with a grin.

"Now, I may be a little dim when it comes to Potions," I began, as they sniggered. "But I am NOT so absolutely stupid as to let Sirius Black operate on my toes. No chance. You're too much like me not to turn them into giant strawberries or something equally as stupid!"

"I was planning on carrots actually. Imagine trying to get those in your shoes!" Sirius said, grinning.

I didn't want to chance even Remus doing the charm after Sirius told me this. He wasn't as bad as Sirius, or me, but he was a Marauder after all! I definitely couldn't perform the spell myself, or I'd probably manage to cut my toes off altogether.

"I guess I'll just permanently wear a pair of socks this year then," I sighed.

"I'm sure that can be arranged," said Sirius, grinning. "Is there a Permanent Sticking charm in that book of yours Moony?"

"I didn't mean _literally _permanently!" I moaned.

"I think you're toes are fine James!" a squeaky voice suddenly piped up from the corner. I beamed while Sirius had a look of disgust on his face.

"Thank you Pete! Some people know how to be kind to their friends!" I said, looking pointedly at Sirius and Remus.

"God Pete, don't be such an arse licker!" Sirius sneered, wiping the look of happiness at my statement from his face.

"I'm sorry Si-Si-Sirius. I won't d-do it again," he stammered.

"You just did do it again!" Sirius exclaimed.

Peter wisely shut up at this point, and Sirius' attention was turned back to me.

"So, now you've got over your mild trauma –". Remus and Sirius laughed. "Are you ready to put The Plan into action?" Sirius asked.

"Of course. Lily will be putty in my hands," I boasted. I didn't actually believe this of course, it was all just talk. I knew my plan would work, but Lily wasn't some pathetic loser who'd do whatever I wanted. That was part of the reason why I liked her so much.

Remus raised his eyebrows, but didn't say anything. Peter was looking confused, as we hadn't told him about the plan yet, so he didn't know what we were talking about. Sirius just laughed knowingly at my arrogance, which matched his own.

We stayed in the compartment for the whole journey, just enjoying the banter and a chance to talk again after a long summer. Me, Remus and Peter opened our sandwiches our mothers had made at lunchtime while Sirius got up to buy something from the trolley.

"Aw, did all your mommies make you some tasty sandwiches?" he taunted bitterly when he returned. We all knew about his relationship with his mother and so we knew she was less likely to make Sirius sandwiches than Snape was to wash his hair.

"Yeah, well, I'd rather she didn't and just gave me money for the trolley. They don't taste that good. I'd prefer to buy a Pumpkin Pasty or something," Remus said trying to comfort Sirius, even though Remus had just eaten his delicious looking turkey sandwich in record time and was now wiping crumbs from his mouth.

"Same here," muttered Peter and me together.

"Whatever guys!" Sirius teased laughingly, apparently already over his dark mood. "I don't care anyway," he said shrugging. "If she made me sandwiches, she'd probably put some awful kind of filling in them anyway, like bat's wings or something."

"Or dragon blood instead of butter!" I added.

"And beetle eyes!" Remus shouted.

"What about, erm… lettuce?" Peter said timidly. Honestly, lettuce! How perfectly un-gruesome! I sometimes wonder why we're even friends with him, I really do.

We all burst out laughing at his pathetic suggestion until he said "What? I really hate it when my Mum puts lettuce in my sandwiches, especially with cucumber!" which made us roar with laughter even harder. Peter giggled along nervously, seemingly unsure of what we were laughing at, which only made us laugh even more, which didn't seem possible.

Before I knew it, it was getting dark and it was time to change. I pulled out my new robes and pulled them over my head. It felt good to be wearing them again, and as I put my wand in the pocket I felt a rush of excitement. We put all our stuff back in our trunks, and left them in the luggage racks to be taken to the castle later.

I saw the familiar lights and shops of Hogsmeade as we shot past. We pulled into the station and I was eager to get off the train and get in a carriage. I still don't know how the hell those things manage to pull themselves, but they must have a really powerful enchantment on them or something. We walked across the platform, receiving many waves from other Gryffindors. I nearly tripped over a firstie who was running to catch up with the rest of the group. I grinned as I remembered my first day of Hogwarts, and the boat ride up to the castle - I'm sure Hagrid won't forget what happened that night in a hurry…

So far, I'd only caught a glimpse of Lily for a split-second as I saw her hair blowing around in the wind just ahead of me. No one else had hair the same as Lily's, I can recognise it anywhere.

The four of us found an empty carriage and clambered in. I felt a lurch as it started to move and I turned towards Remus and Sirius.

"So, this is the last year of being underage wizards then huh?" I said happily. I couldn't wait to be able to apparate, and do whatever magic I wanted, whenever I wanted. It would make pranking a whole lot easier. I could tell Sirius was thinking along the same lines as he grinned at me.

"Yeah, but I've only got two months until I'm seventeen," he said grinning. I hadn't thought of this – Sirius would be seventeen before me. No fair!

"Oh shut up," I snarled. "It's only a few months longer until I am too. It's not like it makes much difference when we're at school anyway. It's the holidays that makes the difference."

"Ah, yes. The holiday between sixth and seventh will be interesting to say the least. Especially if I do come stay with you and your folks Prongs!" Sirius said excitedly.

"You're staying with the Potters in the holidays? Cool!" exclaimed Remus.

"Hopefully," I said. "You can come too for a bit Remus, if you're parents don't mind you leaving them early."

Sirius snorted at this, and said "No chance of my parents caring. They probably won't even notice I'm gone."

Peter looked hopefully at me, but I just grinned at him a little sheepishly.

We were soon up at the castle. We climbed out of the carriage, and walked to the front doors, pushing through the crowds. We rushed eagerly through and into the entrance hall.

Finally. I was back.

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**A/N Okay, so I hope you enjoyed the third chapter! Again, I know it's not very long, but I felt like it ended there. Please leave a review, I really appreciate them!**

**And by the way, apparently 'Corpus Vicis' means something like 'body change' in Latin, so that's why I used it for he spell. I know zero Latin, I just used a translator; so that is probably a completely wrong translation. Feel free to tell me so.**

**Review please!**


	4. Rules

**A/N So here's the fourth chapter! Thanks to all the people who reviewed or put my story on alert, it really means alot to me. Please R&R!**

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Chapter 4 – Rules

The entrance hall was packed full of students pushing to get into the Great Hall. Bright torches were lit all around the hall and I could hear the many echoes of footsteps on the stone floor. We managed to part the crowds fairly easily using a few well-placed winks and smiles from Sirius and I towards our admirers, and we were soon streaming through the doors on the right that led into the Great Hall.

I looked around at the familiar hall as we entered. The four long house tables were present as always, as well as the staff table. The enchanted ceiling was pitch black, dotted with a few bright stars, just like the sky we had seen only minutes earlier outside the front doors.

The four of us walked – well, Sirius and I swaggered – to the Gryffindor table. Near the head of the table, Lily was sat with a few of her friends, laughing and gossiping with them. I nearly stopped in my tracks as I saw her. She seemed more beautiful than ever. She had let her hair grow far down her back, and in the light of the hovering candles, her eyes were sparkling like jewels. As she glanced over her shoulder and saw me standing there, she gave a slight scowl and moved over a little to fill the empty space on the bench next to her.

Lily didn't know, however, that I wasn't going to attempt to sit next to her like I did at the start of fifth year. I kept walking between the tables, only glancing over my shoulder twice to look back at her. I could see the look of shock on her face that she tried hard to disguise at the fact that I hadn't even said hello. I smiled – The Plan was working already and the feast was yet to begin.

Sirius, Remus, Peter and I found seats right at the other end of the long table, closest to the teachers.

"Did you see that look that Evans had when you didn't say anything too her?" Sirius asked, grinning. "She tried to hide it Prongs, but she looked so damn shocked! Maybe even slightly disappointed!"

I also tried to hide my feelings as he said this, but I couldn't help grinning. "She probably wasn't disappointed Sirius. Shocked, yes, but disappointed?" I stammered, pretending it was no big deal, even though I felt ecstatic. If this is how excited I get just when Lily looks disappointed that I hadn't talked to her, I thought that I'd probably faint if she said hello. A 'how was your holiday?' would probably stop my heat from beating entirely.

"Shut up with the modesty James," Sirius replied. "I know you're happy. Which is completely sad, by the way."

"Oy, shut up! Just because I actually like a _girl_, not her boobs – "

"Hey!" Sirius interrupted, faking hurt at my words. "I'm all about the ass James, you know that! I mean, the boobs are important too of course, but I'm more of an ass man," he said with a wicked grin.

"Oh yes, sorry. How could I forget?" I muttered sarcastically, rolling my eyes.

Before Sirius could say anything else, the sorting had started. I slumped in my chair as McGonagall took out a long scroll and let it unravel. The bottom touched the floor, and she read the first name.

"Aarup, Michael"

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The sorting continued for the better part of an hour, and by the time 'Zuckerman, Charlotte" had been sorted into Slytherin, I was too hungry to even cheer for the new Gryffindors.

I could tell that Sirius was as relieved as I was when Dumbledore finished his speech with a warning to stay away from the Forbidden Forest (strangely, he looked at me while he said this) and that Filch was re-enforcing his ban of Zonkos products. The platters in front of us were filled instantly with delicious food, and we began to pile it onto the solid gold plates. I always got some of everything at the start of year feast – I did love my mother's cooking, but it certainly didn't match up to the house elves'.

"Vohh mah fohdnessh, I mished ogwarths oodd vohh vwuddy moch!" Sirius exclaimed. Obviously, he had just shoved a huge forkful of cottage pie into his mouth.

"Come again?" I teased, after pointedly finishing my mouthful.

"I said," he replied, swallowing. "I missed Hogwarts food so bloody much!"

"Ah," Remus said. "Same here."

"And here," I agreed.

We looked at Peter, but he was too busy shovelling potatoes into his mouth to notice the conversation around him.

"So," Remus said, leaning in towards Sirius and me who were on the opposite side of the table to him. "You remember the rules James?"

"I think so," I replied, knowing instantly what he was talking about.

"Well, lets go over them anyway," Sirius announced. "So, number one – don't go out of your way to talk to her. For example, don't swim out to the middle of the lake in your robes because you want to talk to Lily when she's swimming," he said, smirking.

"Hey!" I exclaimed defensively. "That was only one time!"

"Number two," he continued, ignoring me. "Don't call her Lils. This only angers it.

"Don't call Lily an it!"

"Number three!" he said, a little louder. "Don't smirk or make an arrogant comment about yourself. Even if it's true, I'm sure Evans won't appreciate it. Number four –" he continued quickly, so I couldn't say anything. "Don't tell her what to do. That'll certainly anger her to the point of no return."

"And the final, most important rule of all…" Remus said,

"Yep, number five – Don't. Ask. Her. Out!"

"Ok, ok, I know!" I moaned.

"Ironic isn't it? To get her to like you, you need to pretend you don't. Pity you didn't realise this three years ago!" Sirius teased.

"Well, let's not dwell on the past!" I snapped.

Sirius snorted into his plate and continued to eat. Peter was still oblivious to anything except for his food and Remus had started talking to Frank and Alice who were sat close by. Frank had sent me an owl during the summer telling me that he and Alice had started dating. I was happy for my mate of course, but I was a little jealous that he had got his girl. I, meanwhile, leaned over the table and tried to see Lily. Staring at her wasn't breaking the rules! I could only see her arm and the side of her head though as she leaned over her plate.

I sighed to myself and then also continued to eat.

The desserts were soon on the tables. My favourite, treacle tart, was on a plate right in front of me. It had barely appeared before I grabbed a slice and started to eat it.

"You know James," said Remus, who was eating a bowl of ice cream. "If your kids like treacle tart half as much as you do, there'll be a treacle shortage worldwide."

"Oh, shut up," I said, my teeth stuck together. "I hope I pass more onto my kids than a love of pastries. My Quidditch skills, for example," I boasted.

"I'm sure they'll be modest like their father too," Sirius said.

"I'm sure Lily will have enough modesty for the both of us."

"Aw," cooed Remus. "Imagine a mini Prongsie! He'll have your scruffy hair, and Lily's eyes."

"Excuse me, but what makes you both think James is gonna marry Lily? They're not even together yet!" Sirius interrupted.

"_Yet_," I repeated.

"Anyway, I feel bad for the kid. Lily for a mother and James as a father? He'll have every personality trait there is!" Sirius laughed.

"Maybe that's a good thing." Remus said.

I said nothing, mainly because of the fact that I agreed with Sirius (for once). Lily and me were like chalk and cheese. But that's partly why I love her. People are always attracted to people who are different to them, right?

I sat gazing into space for the next ten minutes, and was suddenly jolted from my daydream as the noise of the benches scraping back as people began to leave the hall deafened me. I spotted Lily walking out of the doors with her friends, so I pulled the other three along with me as I hurried after her, trying to keep up.

Sirius, Peter, Remus and I hurried up to the common room. When we arrived, I saw that Lily had decided to sit down for a bit. She was lounged on a sofa right at the foot of the boy's staircase. Perfect. I walked confidently towards the stairs and I could feel her watching me. When I had almost past her, I looked around and pretended to notice her for the first time. She saw me looking, and sighed as she waited for me to ask her the question she had heard frequently over the past years. But it never came.

"Oh, hey Lily," I said nonchalantly. "Good summer?"

She seemed rather taken aback. "Erm, yeah, it was ok Potter," she muttered, seeming too dazed at my lack of arrogance towards her to say anything else.

"Good," I said with a smile. "I'll see you at breakfast then." I said. I slowly walked up the stairs, and entered the sixth year dormitory, leaving an utterly confused Lily in my wake.

* * *

**A/N Yeah, I know there still was hardly any James/Lily interactions, but I'm building up to it, I promise! So, did you like it? Please review!**


	5. Making Progress

**A/N Right – I WILL NOT FORGET THE DISCLAIMER! I've forgotten every chapter until now, so I'm sorry if you've mistaken me as J.K Rowling. I can assure you, I am not, and I do not own Harry Potter. The characters are (regrettably) entirely her creation. Anyway, now that's over with, here's Chapter 5! Please review!**

* * *

Chapter 5 – Making Progress

I woke up the next morning feeling pretty optimistic. Lily and me had spoken – and she hadn't tried to hex me into oblivion!

"Morning, boys! Wake up, we've got a long and interesting day ahead of us!" I said happily, throwing off my covers and prodding the bundles of bedding that were Sirius, Remus and Peter. Sirius responded by grabbing his pillow, throwing it at my head and muttering something incoherent into his mattress. Remus sat up and stretched, happy to wake up and get down to breakfast. Peter just lay there; sound asleep, and oblivious to everything around him, as always.

"Now, now, Paddy! Don't get violent, I just thought you'd want to some breakfast!" I tutted.

"Okay, I'm awfully sorry Jamesy," Sirius said sweetly. "Would you be a kind little boy and pass me back my pillow so I can make the bed?"

"Oh, well…" I said, mimicking his voice. "…how about NO? How dumb do you think I am? Making the bed? You haven't made the bed in the whole six years you've been here!"

"FINE!" Sirius shouted. "I'm getting up - "

"Finally," I moaned, looking through my drawer for some socks.

" – In a minute!" he continued, pulling his sheets over his head.

"Oh, well," Remus said yawning. "Let him sleep. He'll be late down to breakfast and then he won't get any food."

"Yeah, but then he'll have a stick up his arse all day!" I argued. "You know how he is without food!"

Remus and I began to get dressed. Peter soon woke up – well, with the help of me, Wingardium Leviosa and numerous heavy objects.

"Don't think you're shooting a lamp at _my_ head," Sirius muttered. "I'm getting up!"

"Good," I said. "It's okay, Lily's a bit of a late riser anyway, she might not be there yet."

"I knew that was why you wanted to get down to the Great Hall so early!"

Sirius and I continued to argue all the way down to breakfast. There weren't many people there yet, so we managed to get our favourite seats right in the middle of the table. McGonagall looked a little confused at our presence so early, but just handed us our timetables and then returned to the teacher's table.

"Urgh," I groaned, throwing my timetable down on the table. "Double Muggle Studies after breakfast, Moony!"

"Remind me again why the two of you take that class?" Sirius said smirking.

"Well, firstly it's an easy class. Second, it is actually mildly interesting. And finally, you're not in it!" I said, grinning back.

"Hey!"

"Just kidding. Final reason I take it is so that when me and Lily get married – " Sirius snorted pointedly " – I won't seem like a complete dunce to her parents. They're Muggles, so they'll be dead impressed that I know all about fellytones and stuff."

"Weren't you even paying attention to class last year James? It's telephones!" Remus moaned exasperatedly. I shrugged.

"Oh, whatever, same thing. Anyway, why do you take Arithmancy Sirius? Everyone knows that's the hardest subject there is!"

"My mother made me. You know what she's like," said Sirius.

I went quiet at this. I tried not to mention anything to do with Sirius' parents, and I felt bad for making him bring them up.

"Haha! I was kidding, it's amazing what you suckers believe if I say Mother made me," he laughed, taking a swig of pumpkin juice cockily. I hit him roughly on the back, which made him choke and a fountain of juice spurted from his mouth, spraying Peter's face.

Remus and I burst out laughing, and after Sirius got over his coughing fit and took one look at Peter's face, he was in stitches too. But Peter? Less so. The beauty of it was though that he didn't want to get mad at us (because of the whole him adoring the three of us thing) so he just sat there a moment, watching the three of us with a hurt look on his face.

"Has anyone got a napkin?" he asked timidly, which made us roar even louder. But Remus, the kinder, more considerate of the three of us handed him one, shaking with laughter. Peter proceeded to wipe his face silently, then continuing to eat his sausage and egg without a word. The three of us turned away from him, still chuckling.

"So, why did you take Arithmancy then Sirius?" I asked.

"I dunno really. I'd heard it was quite interesting, and it looks really good if you have a NEWT in it when you apply for a job."

Remus and I looked rather bewilderedly at Sirius, who had just said what was possibly the most intelligent thing he'd said in his life.

"And," he continued sombrely. "The sooner I get a good job, the sooner I can buy my own place and move out of my parents house. You know how much I hate it there with them."

The table became rather silent once again and Remus and I awkwardly continued to eat our toast.

"Gotcha again, suckers!"

* * *

"Hey Lily," I said, smiling as she walked through the door.

"What do you want Potter?" she replied suspiciously.

"Erm, nothing. Just saying hi," I stammered.

"Oh. Well, hi Potter."

She then walked down to the front of the class, looking slightly bemused and took a seat next to Alice. I sighed as she walked past, wishing she would come sit with Remus and me. It was the first period of the day, Muggle Studies and it was the first time I'd seen Lily. She must have been sat right at the end of the table at breakfast, and she obviously didn't go out of her way to let me know she was there. Since I realised Lily was doing Muggle Studies on the first day of third year, I've always wondered why. I mean, she was _raised _as a Muggle. She knows everything the teacher knows about Muggles, if not more so why did she join a class about them? I suppose she just chose it because she knew it'd be easy for her (which it definitely is. Usually, she pays even less attention than me, and just doodles on her parchment or passes notes to Alice) and she thought she could goof off.

"Welcome back to Muggle Studies," said Professor Burbage. "Today, we will be..."

* * *

As I began to pack up my books after a particularly boring class about something called computers, Lily walked past me and said with a nervous smile "See you, Potter."

She said see you! Which means she wants to see me! Which means she doesn't detest me! Remus had heard Lily, and gave me a knowing smirk as I beamed. He had Ancient Runes next, whereas I had Care of Magical Creatures so he said goodbye and walked out of the classroom. Alice stopped for a moment when she reached me, and motioned to Lily who was stood outside the door, holding it open for her, that she'd be there in a minute. Lily gave her a fierce glare, and Alice rolled her eyes as if she were telling Lily to relax. She closed the door behind her.

"Hey James," she said, smiling. I was pretty good friends with Alice, due to the fact that whenever I was with Frank last year, Alice often hung out with us too (much to Lily's disgust.)

"Hiya Alice. How are you?" I said, pulling my bag over my shoulder.

"I'm good thanks James."

"And how's ol' Frank?" I said smirking.

Alice blushed. "He's good too."

"So, fun lesson today huh?" I joked.

"Oh, yeah. Totally. I almost managed to keep my eyes open," she giggled.

"What did you guys to occupy yourselves? Remus and I finally agreed to play noughts and crosses with me. Even he couldn't pretend he was interested."

"Well…" Alice said with a grin. "That's what I wanted to talk to you about actually. Don't tell Lily, though – she'll go insane! We were passing notes and I brought up the subject of, well, you, and she said how she thought –"

Alice stopped when the door to the classroom swung open and Lily's head appeared in the doorway.

"Come on Alice, we're gonna be late!" she moaned. She turned towards me and said "Have you got Care of Magical Creatures now Potter?"

"Yeah."

"Well, Alice can tell you whatever it is she had to tell you while we're walking down there."

I happily agreed, and the three of us began to walk down to the grounds. I could tell Alice didn't want Lily to know about what she was about to tell me, so I decided I'd just ask Alice later.

"So," I said. "How did you two do on the OWLs?"

"Ugh," Alice moaned. "Don't remind me."

Lily grinned at me (she has such a beautiful smile) and said, "I did pretty good thanks - mostly Exceeded Expectations. Two Outstandings, one in Muggle Studies and one in Charms. Alice, meanwhile…"

"I got mostly Acceptables, two Dreadfuls and a Troll!" Alice moaned.

"That's not so bad," I said nicely. "Peter got three Trolls! I'm surprised they let him come back!"

The other two laughed at this, and I could tell Lily was pleasantly surprised that I hadn't made Alice feel bad about her results. More proof I was maturing!

"What about you then, James?" asked Alice. "Any Outstandings?"

"Erm, yeah. Three actually." I replied sheepishly. Lily and Alice looked surprised. "Not that I'm boasting or anything!" I added quickly. Of course, I had boasted – to Sirius, Remus and my parents. But I remembered Rule Number Three – No arrogance.

"Woah. Who knew you were such a geek," teased Lily.

"Hey! I remember a certain someone got 112 on the charms exam in fourth year!"

"Actually," replied Lily. "It was 113."

"Ooh, okay. Sorry!"

"It's alright, Potter. I'll forgive you, I guess."

We were, dare I say it, actually _flirting_. Alice merely looked at us, a bemused expression on her face. The three of us walked rather slowly to the grounds, laughing and talking. It was amazing – never had I had such a long conversation with Lily. As we reached the rest of the class, who were gathered near the lake, I looked through the faces and picked out Sirius'.

He was wearing a look of complete and utter shock.

* * *

**A/N Please review!**


	6. Care of Magical Creatures

**A/N I remembered the disclaimer again! I am not JK Rowling, and I don't own Harry Potter, etc. **

**It is really great that I have some really loyal reviewers, thanks to all you guys (please keep it up!), but it'd be really great to get some reviews from different people too. I know a lot of people have this on their alerts, so it'd be great to get some new reviewers.**

**Enjoy Chapter 6!**

* * *

Chapter 6 – Care of Magical Creatures

"Prewett! Potter! Evans! Would you care to explain to me and the rest of your class why you were so late?"

Professor Rackstraw was one of the strictest teachers I had, and being late to her class wasn't something you'd want to do unless you enjoy a week of detentions. But detention was a small price to pay for walking slowly to class with Lily. Alice didn't look too bothered either, but Lily looked a little nervous. She didn't like getting into trouble with teachers – she was a prefect, after all. Rackstraw was stood with her hands on her rather wide hips, her eyes darting between the three of us.

"Sorry, Professor," I said politely. "We got caught up after our last lesson, the teacher kept us behind."

Lily sucked in her breath at my lie, but Alice grinned appreciatively. She grinned at Frank, who was stood with Sirius and Peter, also looking rather confused.

"Hmm," said Professor Rackstraw suspiciously, narrowing her eyes. "Well, if it wasn't for the fact that you are with Miss Evans, Potter, I wouldn't believe you. Now, as I was saying…"

She turned back to rest of the class, and the three of us quickly joined them.

"Today we're going to be doing unicorns," she continued. "I know you've done your unicorn topic already in third year, but what with your NEWTs coming up next year, some of you could do with a little revision." She looked pointedly at Sirius and me as she said this. "So, girls come forward please, boys stay back a little – but that doesn't mean you can mess around," she said sternly.

Lily and Alice walked forwards from where we were standing and joined the little gang of girls already huddled around the unicorn, all oohing and aahing. I couldn't see what was so special, too be honest. Yeah, they're not as ugly as some of the things we have to study, but they're just like big white horses with a horn on.

With Lily safely out of earshot, Frank, Remus, and Sirius walked quickly over to me, leaving Peter staring apprehensively at the unicorn.

"So…" said Sirius. "Explain."

"What?" I said innocently.

"You know what, Potter," said Frank. "You were flirting with Lily, the girl who's hated you since, well, forever really. And you were also flirting with my girlfriend, may I add."

Frank glared at me, frowning.

"Oh, relax Frank," said Sirius. "You know James would only ever flirt with dear sweet Lilykins. He's weird like that."

"Just because I don't flirt with everything that moves…"

"Oh, shut up. Even I draw the line at Snivellus."

"Let's get back to the important stuff," Remus moaned. "How did your talking with Lily and her not hexing you come about?"

"I'm not sure really," I admitted. "I suppose I really have matured over the summer. That, and the fact that the plan was amazing."

Sirius made a snorting noise and looked at me a little disbelievingly. "I never thought it'd actually work!"

"Glad to hear you have so much faith in me, Paddy!" I said sarcastically, rolling my eyes.

Sirius just grinned at me, and walked over to Pete, who was still standing a little way away looking slightly nervously at the unicorn. On the outside, I was trying to stay cool and calm, but my heart felt like it was leaping up and down inside my chest. Finally, after all these years, Lily and I were getting along!

I looked over at her from my position a couple of feet away. She was standing with Alice by the unicorn's mane, stroking it absentmindedly. Alice was saying something to her, but I could tell she wasn't really listening. She turned her head a little and saw me looking at her. She gave me a slight smile, and then turned hastily away from me, finally giving her full attention to Alice.

I continued to watch her. The unicorn's head was just about level with Lily's, and as she turned her back to me, the contrast of her red hair and the pure white of the unicorn was amazing. I stood there in a trance until Professor Rackstraw beckoned me and the other boys closer to the unicorn

"Now that she's calmed down, she'll be alright with a boy's touch," Rackstraw said when we were in earshot.

I've never been afraid of animals, even magical ones, so I didn't hesitate in putting out my hand to stroke it. The unicorn was silky smooth, and a pure white colour – the only other thing I've ever seen that's as white as a unicorn is a fresh sheet of snow. After a few moments, I moved over to the unicorn's head, near to where Lily was.

Lily turned round and saw me standing there, and said "Hi Potter. Come stroke her mane."

"Professor said she doesn't take kindly to boys who go near her head," I said, but moved forwards anyway. If it meant I'd be close to Lily, I didn't care what the damn unicorn did with its horn.

I put my hand out to touch the mane, but Lily's hand was still slowly moving up and down the unicorn's neck and I somehow put my hand down on her's – it was an accident though. I swear.

"Oh!" I mumbled, quickly moving my hand away. "Sorry Lily."

"No worries Ja-Potter."

I grinned. "You were gonna call me James weren't you Lily!"

"Nah. I was gonna call you…"

"Whatever it was you were going to call me Lily, as long as it's not Potter anymore, I'm cool with it."

"Really?" A devilish sparkle appeared in her eyes. I could almost hear her mind whirring. Oops. "Yeah, I was going to call you Jam Pot."

"Jam Pot? Okay, sure. Just call me Jam Pot Potter," I responded, grinning. "But that means I get to call you whatever I want too!"

"Ugh," she moaned. "I was afraid of that."

"I choose Lils," I said quickly.

"Lils? Yeah, I hate that name, but I thought you'd come up with some awfully embarrassing nickname, like I chose for you."

"Well, I just wanted to be able to call you Lils without you hexing me," I laughed.

She giggled. "I guess I have been a little harsh in the past."

I raised my eyebrows.

"Okay, okay, _a lot _harsh, but you used to be a really, really big berk you know."

"I know, but I'm trying to change Lils!"

She winced as I called her Lils, and continued to stroke the unicorn's mane.

"I've noticed," she said, deadpan.

_What does she mean? _I thought. _Is she trying to tell me something? Why is she so serious all of a sudden?_

I looked up at her face and my eyes met hers. She looked a little confused, god knows why. She shook her head and sighed.

"I'm gonna go talk to Alice. Later," she mumbled, and walked away from me. I stood there for a moment, and then walked back over to Sirius.

"Sirius, mate," I said. "I will never understand girls. We were getting on great, then when I said 'I'm trying to change', meaning I was trying to mature, she just said 'I've noticed' and then made an excuse and walked away! It's like she didn't want to hear me say it, because she didn't want to believe it. Do you know what I mean?"

"Nope, mate, I don't. Sorry."

"Thanks for being so helpful!"

"Well, I have no idea what the hell girls are talking about half the time. I don't really listen to what they say when I'm with them, you know?" He winked at me and I rolled my eyes.

"Ugh, forget it. I'll go talk to Moony."

"Glad to be of help to you mate!" yelled Sirius as I walked away.

As I repeated to Remus what I had said to Sirius, he had a thoughtful look on his face.

"Hmm. I think that Lily felt awkward because she was realising that you have actually changed, and that she doesn't hate you anymore. Quite the opposite, probably. And I don't think she really wants to admit to herself that she likes you, when she's hated you for so long. I think it'll be harder for you to convince her that she actually does love you than we thought it would be. Lily's rather stubborn."

I gaped at Remus, mouth open and eyes wide.

"How do you know this stuff Remus?" I gasped incredulously. "You've never really gone out with many girls before, how do you understand them?"

"I just understand people James," sighed Remus.

"Yeah, but why can't she just get on with it and admit she doesn't hate me anymore?"

Remus chuckled, and said, almost pityingly, "Things aren't really that simple James. She'll still be confused about how she feels; we've only been back at school for less than two days, let her sort her head out. It'll take time."

"What is there to sort out? I'm nice now, I'm not arrogant, and we're getting along! I mean, I know I shouldn't ask her out yet, that'd put her right off, but shouldn't it be a little more obvious to me that she likes me?"

"Bloody hell James! You've only had a few conversations with her, it takes time for some people to develop feelings for someone! You've had six years of liking Lily, it seems pretty simple to you, but not to her. Give it a week or so, ok?" said Remus, rolling his eyes.

Before I could reply, class was over. As Remus and I were stood waiting for Sirius and Peter to join us, Lily walked past with Alice and another of her friends, Sarah. She looked a little less awkward, and smiled, saying "See you later, Jam Pot Potter."

"What the hell?" asked Remus.

I smiled. "Inside joke."

* * *

**A/N So, did you like it? Please review! I ended the chapter this way because I felt like James would love the idea of having an in-joke with Lily :)**

**And yes, I know we still didn't find out what Alice was going to say, I couldn't really work it into the chapter, but it should be in the next one, I promise!**

**Anyway, please leave a review!**


	7. Break

**A/N Sorry this was a long time, I've been really busy with end-of-year tests and stuff. Please review!**

* * *

Chapter 7 - Break

As Remus, Sirius, Peter and I walked over to our favourite tree by the lake, I began to lose track of the conversation. It was something to do with Quidditch, which would usually have interested me, but today it seemed trivial. There were far more important things for me think about. Well, one more important thing. Lily. I was still confused about what had happened earlier, but I tried to forget about it. Girls did act weird sometimes, after all.

I thought instead about what Alice had been about to say, before Lily had come into the classroom. Due to the fact that I was with Lily afterwards, it had gone completely out of my mind and I hadn't given it anymore thought. I tried to imagine what she had been about to say.

'_She said she thought…' _She thought what? She thought I had ugly toes? Oh god, I knew she'd noticed them. No, that can't be it. If it were anything negative about my physical appearance, Lily would have no problems telling me herself. She never seemed to feel bad about it, like when she told me my nose was big and my hair looked like a hedgehog. But I prefer to think of it as constructive criticism – it hurts less.

I was still thinking about what Alice could possibly have been about to say when we reached the tree.

"Prongs?" shouted Sirius, waving his hand in front of my face.

"Yeah?" I said absent-mindedly, leaning back against the trunk.

"I've been trying to talk to you for the past minute James. Are you deaf or something?"

"Nah," said Remus, sitting down next to me. "He's just in love."

"You aren't still thinking about Lily are you James? Because I swear, if I hear that chick's name one more time –"

I never found out what would have happened if I'd mentioned 'that chick's name', due to the fact that said chick had appeared in front of us, Alice and Frank on her right, holding hands.

"Hey, guys," said Frank. "Mind if we sit?"

"Sure," replied Remus, giving Sirius a warning glare as he did so. The others seemed to miss this as they sat down on the grass. Lily gave me a smile as she sat directly in front of me.

"Hey, Jammy," she grinned.

"I believe we agreed on 'Jam Pot', Lils. I draw the line at Jammy," I replied, grinning back

Lily rolled her eyes, and she turned to Sirius, Alice and Frank who were talking about Quidditch.

"Yeah, I think we have a pretty good chance this year," reasoned Frank. "We have three awesome seekers – James, Alice and Ferguson, two amazing beaters – me and Sirius – "

Sirius gave a mock bow at this, and pretended to swing an imaginary beaters bat at Peter, who squealed. We all laughed, Lily a little guiltily, and he grinned sheepishly before returning to his conversation with Remus who was giving advice about a charm Peter had failed to master last year.

"We just need to find a new seeker and keeper," Frank continued, still chuckling. "I'm sure there's some decent players left in Gryffindor. Like Lily, for example…"

He turned to Lily with a hopeful look on his face.

"You know I don't like Quidditch, Frank," said Lily exasperatedly.

I gave a sharp intake of breath at this, but let her continue. "Sure, I'm okay on a broom, but I can't catch the quaffle or the snitch to save my life!"

Frank made a disapproving noise, and turned instead to Peter.

"Pete?" he said hopefully

"You're kidding, right?" guffawed Sirius. "Peter can hardly stay on a broom, let alone fly it."

"Hey!" exclaimed Alice. "Don't be so mean to Peter. It might come back to you one day, you know."

"Ah, whatever Prewett. Peter's cool with it, he knows we're only kidding. Anyway, what's he going to do? Get revenge? I doubt it."

"Yeah," wheezed Peter shyly. "It's fine, Alice."

"Fine then!" replied Alice haughtily. "I won't say anything in future!"

"Ooh, good," Sirius said. "Maybe we'll all get some peace and quiet."

Alice made a noise similar to the one Frank had made earlier, and said, "Who are you to talk, Black? You never shut up most of the time."

The two of them continued to bicker as the rest of us turned away from them. Lily grinned and rolled her eyes at me. Alice paused for breath, and looked over at the two of us. As Sirius opened his mouth to speak, she lazily cast a silencing charm on him, causing him to open and close his mouth with no sound coming out. She pulled her eyes away from Lily and I, and turned to Frank.

"Sweetie, didn't you say you needed to borrow Lily's potions notes from last year?"

"I did?" replied Frank. Alice elbowed him in the ribs, and stared at him. "Oh, yeah, I mean, I do. Can you go get them Lily?" he asked, confused, glancing furtively at Alice.

"Oh, no," interrupted Alice. "Why don't you both go? I'll meet the two of you in Potions."

"Erm, okay," said Lily suspiciously. "Come on then Frank, they're in my dorm."

The two of them stood up and looked at Alice, Frank looking bemused and Lily a little suspicious.

As soon as they were out of earshot, Sirius and I both turned to Alice.

"What did you do that for?" I asked angrily. "Me and Lily were getting on nicely, and you make her leave?"

Sirius moved his mouth up and down, seemingly forgetting that he had been silenced.

"Aw, go on Alice. Take off the spell. A quiet Sirius is a weird Sirius," said Remus.

"Fine," sighed Alice, waving her wand at Sirius and muttering the counter-charm. Silencio was the only charm Alice had fully mastered last year, unfortunately for Sirius.

"Finally!" exclaimed Sirius. "Why d'you send them off together like that? Do you want your boyfriend and best friend to get together or something?"

"God, guys, relax. You really are dumb. I need to talk to you James, without Lily here," Alice explained.

"Oh. You're going to tell me what you were gonna tell me in Muggle Studies?"

"Yeah."

We ignored Peter, Remus and Sirius' questioning looks, and Alice continued.

"Well, as I said, we were passing notes. And I, y'know, casually brought you up, and she said she thought you'd really matured over the summer. And she said that you actually seem nice now, and the fact that you're yet to ask her out even _once _makes her like you a whole lot more. Oh, yeah, and she said that she's always regretted saying your hair looks like a hedgehog. Apparently, she really likes your hair. Speak for herself," she added, looking up at my scruffy jet-black hair.

By the time Alice had finished, I was already beaming. Lily thought I was funny! And nice! And she actually liked my hair! It was a lot to take in, so I didn't say anything right away. Sirius, however, didn't seem to have been rendered speechless. He never was.

"Well, there you are Prongs mate. Evans likes you, and you like her, so the two of you can get together and stop boring us by talking about her. Okay?"

"It's not that simple," I replied pompously, echoing Remus' words from before.

"No, it's not," agreed Alice. "Lily definitely won't admit it, so you have to draw it out of her. I only told you what she said because I'm bored stiff by Lily's complaints and moans about you, so the sooner the two of you get together and stop boring the rest of us. But I swear Potter," she said, drawing closer to me, her voice becoming slightly threatening. "You hurt her, and you'll have me to answer to."

Red sparks flew from her wand, which was rather closer to my face than I would have liked. I gulped, as Sirius tried not to laugh.

"Oops, sorry about that," said Alice, drawing away from me, her voice instantly light and friendly again. "Sometimes, when I get really strong feelings, I make sparks come out of my wand without meaning to. There was this one time when me and Frank were getting a little, shall I say, passionate, and my wand was in my pocket, and it – "

"Whoa, okay Prewett," interrupted Sirius. "We don't need to hear about your heavy snogging sessions with Frank," he moaned.

Alice grinned cheekily, but fortunately shut up. We heard the bell ring faintly in the castle, and we all moaned as we began to get to our feet.

"Ugh. Double Potions," I moaned.

"At least you can do it! Don't you remember last year, when I blew up my cauldron?" said Alice.

"I think we all remember. I was at the cauldron next to you, remember?" groaned Sirius as we began to walk up to the castle.

"Oh, yeah," grinned Alice happily. "I remember the boils too. It took three days for them to fully disappear didn't it?

"I think it was four," I replied, grinning.

"Thanks, James," said Sirius sarcastically. "It was just a shame you weren't at your cauldron when it happened though Prewett. You would have looked rather more attractive with a face covered in boils."

"Even the boils covering your face didn't hide the ugliness that hides underneath, Black."

"Shut up."

"Why don't you?"

"Why don't you BOTH shut up?" I shouted.

"I will if she will," muttered Sirius.

"Well, I will if you will," Alice snarled.

"That's settled then. You can both shut up, so Remus, Peter and I can have a _civilized conversation_," I commanded.

"I don't like mature James!" whined Sirius.

"Well, get used to him. He's here to stay," I said firmly. "Well, we can still do pranks. As long as Lily isn't there. And I'm sure I won't object to a little Snape-Jinxing."

"As much as I think your dumb pranks are stupid, I don't mind you guys being jerks to Snape. He really is an arse, I have no idea why Lily hangs around with him," Alice said thoughtfully.

"Wow. Prewett said something sensible," teased Sirius.

"I, unlike you Black, am always sensible."

"Ah, whatever Prewett. As long as you hate Snivellus as much as we do, I'm sure we'll get along fine."

"Hmm. Snivellus. Suits him," Alice replied.

"It does, doesn't it," I agreed.

We had reached the dungeons by this time, and we saw Lily and Frank waiting by the entrance to the Potions classroom. Frank had a large stack of parchments in his hands. Unfortunately for Frank, Lily took _a lot_ of notes.

"Finally!" exclaimed Lily.

Sirius ignored her, and said, "Come on, let's get in there. Charlotte Baxter is in this class, and have you seen the arse on that chick?"

Alice and Lily snorted in disgust, and Remus and I merely rolled our eyes – we'd heard all about Charlotte's arse many times before.

We all walked into the classroom, and took seats on a table near the back.

After Professor Dent's predictable and tedious start of year speech he'd made every year since we'd been at Hogwarts, he told us to pair up.

I turned automatically to Sirius who shrugged apologetically. Usually, Alice would pair up with Lily, Remus with Peter (who needed all the help he could get), Frank with this Hufflepuff kid who hadn't made it through to Advanced Potions this year (how Alice managed to scrape an acceptable in her OWL, I'll never know) and I would go with Sirius. This was how it had been every year in Potions since first.

"Sorry, mate," Sirius apologized. "Charlotte has been making eyes at me across the room, and I was planning on asking her to be my partner. You know I'm a sucker for a hot girl. Wish my luck!"

He sauntered across the room without another word, and tapped Charlotte on the shoulder. I turned away with disgust – Sirius really does have a problem when it comes to girls. Not that I can talk, really, but at least I'm not obsessed with _all _of them.

Remus and Peter had already begun to set up their cauldron. Alice and Lily however, were having a similar conversation to mine and Sirius' across the table.

"I'm sorry, Lily, I really am, but he's my boyfriend after all. You're a popular girl; someone will want to be your partner. Talk to you later," apologized Alice, in exactly the same tone of voice as Sirius – apologizing, but not really sorry.

Lily looked around the room, but everyone was already with a partner. Well, except for one other person.

Her eyes fell on me, alone, still in my seat.

"Looks like we're partners then, James."

"Looks like we are."

I'm so glad Charlotte has a nice arse.


	8. Swelling Solution Brings People Closer

**A/N Here's another chapter for you all :) Enjoy!**

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Chapter 8 – Swelling Solution Brings People Closer

Lily grabbed my arm and lifted it away from the cauldron.

"Not yet, James!" she said exasperatedly. "You put the beetle eyes in after letting the potion stew for four minutes. I thought you were good at potions?"

To tell the truth, I thought I was good at potions as well - until today, with Lily close behind me. At one point, some of her hair rested on my shoulder when she had flicked her head and I could see the long strand out of the corner of my eye. Her presence was putting potions out of mind, and I could hardly concentrate. I knew my Potions grades would be decreasing this year.

"I am good, Lils. I just get confused sometimes!"

"Well, don't. If you put something in at the wrong time, god knows what might happen," said Lily.

"I know. I remember what happened to Alice."

Lily laughed and looked over at Alice and Frank, who both had their hands on the same knife and were chopping roots of asphodel.

"Aw. Look how cute they are," she said, tilting her head to one side and smiling happily.

"Yeah. Cute," I agreed.

We stood there in an awkward silence for a few moments, both of our eyes transfixed on the blue potion.

"I think it's been four minutes now," said Lily loudly, making me jump. "You can put the beetle eyes in."

I obediently poured them in and began to stir the potion.

"No, James," she sighed. "Anti-clockwise."

I immediately changed direction and the potion began to darken to a deep shade of navy blue, like Alice and Frank's. I watched Lily as I stirred, who was cutting up our roots of asphodel. I suddenly realised that I couldn't even remember what we were making, so I glanced at Lily's spell book, which lay open on the table.

I read the title of the potion – Swelling Solution. Oh, dear. It was a good job I hadn't spilled this all over the place. _Yet_. I doubt my already large nose (according to Lily) would become any more attractive if it swelled to become the size of a dinner plate.

"So, Lils, what did you do over the summer?" I asked, breaking the silence as I continued to stir.

"Oh, y'know, nothing exciting. My sister Petunia brought her new boyfriend round to show him off to our parents, although I'm not sure if she had anything to show off about. He was a beef of a boy."

I grinned. "I take it you didn't like him too much then?"

"You could say that. He doesn't like anything out of the ordinary, and his favourite phrase is 'what a load of nonsense'. He was over at our house practically every day, so I stayed in my room most of the time. I don't think my parents like him either, but Petunia seemed so proud of him they didn't want to tell her. I didn't have a problem with it though." She smirked, and her eyes glazed over as she thought back to the occasion.

"I've never got on with Petunia," she continued. "Well, I used too, but once I came to Hogwarts, we just kind of drifted apart. I think she wanted to come too, and she's rather jealous. Anyway, I told her what a jerk I thought Vernon – that's his name, Vernon Dursley – was, but she didn't agree. Hopefully, they'll get married soon and move away, and I'll never have to see her again."

"I didn't know you had a sister," I said.

"You don't know a lot of thinks about me, Jam Pot."

"I'd like to."

"Nah, you don't. I'm rather boring."

"Lily, you are anything but boring."

She grinned appreciatively. "Is that a compliment?"

"I guess. Wanna give one in return?"

"Not really."

"Ah, go on. Anything."

"Okay then… I don't hate you."

She blushed, and I grinned.

"That supposed to be a compliment Lils?"

"Hey, beggars can't be choosers James. You should be glad you got that out of me. Anyway, what did you do in the summer?"

We continued to talk about the holidays happily whilst we continued with the potions. She did most of the chopping, measuring and preparing. I just stirred - that was all Lily would let me do.

Conversation soon turned to Hogwarts, due to the fact that neither of us did much in the summer.

"I really miss it in the holdiays," Lily sighed.

"Me too. I love seeing my parents and everything, but I miss being here," I agreed.

We never ran out of things to talk about, and the conversation flowed easily. We had soon finished the potion, and we were the first pair to do so. I looked over at Peter and Remus. Remus was trying to do his own jobs, but was having to look over at Peter almost constantly to make sure he wasn't doing anything wrong. Which was pretty frequently. Alice and Frank had almost finished their potion, and the two of them were acting more loved up than ever. I sighed, before looking at Sirius and Charlotte, who had hardly started their potion. Charlotte looked as if she was already under Sirius' spell, and she nodded along happily to everything he said.

Lily called Professor Dent over, and he looked at the two of us in surprise.

"Goodness gracious. I never thought I'd see the day when Lily Evans would willingly work with James Potter," the Professor said.

"Yeah, me neither," agreed Lily. "But he's… different to last year."

"Hmm. Well, anyway, lets have a look at your potion."

He moved over to our cauldron, and bent over it. He sniffed, and stirred it a little. Lily and I stood there patiently, watching him intently.

He stood up and looked at us both. "Well. Looks like the two of you make quite a team. Twenty points for Gryffindor, well done."

The two us looked at each other happily. This was a common occurrence for Lily, but I hadn't ever earned so much as a point in Potions. I've lost plenty, sure, but never gained any. Maybe the distraction of being paired with Lily wouldn't bring my grades down after all. It's not like I was exactly a perfect student when I was working with Sirius – I'm pretty good at Potions, but the amount of time spent messing around with Sirius meant I wasn't exactly Professor Dent's favourite pupil.

"Looks like I am pretty good at Potions after all," I said to Lily.

"You mean, looks like you're pretty good at stirring while I do all the hard stuff?"

"Yeah, pretty much."

Lily rolled her eyes at me.

"So, what are we going to do while we wait for everyone else to finish?" She said.

"I dunno, we were pretty quick," I said proudly. "It might be a while," I added, eyeing Charlotte and Sirius. It seemed Sirius had stirred a little too vigorously, probably in a lame attempt to impress Charlotte, and some of it had splashed on his hands. Several of his fingers now vaguely resembled fat pink sausages.

"I know. It looks like Remus might start pulling his hair out in a minute. Peter isn't exactly the best at Potions."

"You could say that," I replied, grinning. "It's a good job the two of us make 'quite a team'," I continued, echoing Professor Dent's words.

"I never thought I'd hear that out loud Jam Pot."

"You didn't, Lils?" I said sarcastically. "Why on earth not?"

"Well, you might be a little surprised to hear this Jammy, but I didn't used to like you too much."

"You didn't?" I said, pretending to be shocked.

"Nope. That was the reason for all those jinxes."

"Oh. I thought you just needed someone to practise on," I joked.

"Well, I did. Still do, actually."

"Anytime, Lils, anytime. Just say the word."

"I will, next time I need someone to practise on. Or just when you become unbearably annoying."

"Aw, Lils. You say the sweetest things."

Lily just grinned at me, and turned to see Alice and Frank walking over to us from their cauldron.

"Hey, guys," said Alice, standing in front of us, Frank next to her.

"Hi Alice," Lily said, smiling. "You guys have finished your potion, then?"

"Yeah, just now. Professor Dent seemed pretty pleased. I guess working with Frank is gonna do wonders for my grades."

"I know what you mean," I agreed, grinning.

"So, that's all you want me for then Alice, huh?" joked Frank.

"No, I want you for your pretty hair, and eyes and your snogging abilities."

"Oh, well that's all right then," Frank replied, putting his arm around Alice.

I looked at Lily, and my heart skipped a beat. In a few weeks, that could be Lily and I.

"I'm gonna be sick in my cauldron if you guys keep acting all lovey-dovey. And I don't think that's one of the ingredients of a Swelling Solution." Lily moaned, smiling to let them know she was joking.

Frank and Alice laughed, and Frank took his arm from around Alice's shoulders.

"I just can't help myself Lily. She's just so amazing, y'know?" Frank said, looking right into Alice's eyes.

"Aw, Frank, you're so sweet," Alice cooed.

"So are you."

"You're sweeter."

"No you are!"

Their love fest ground to a halt at the noise of both Lily and I miming being sick in unison.

Alice stuck out her tongue, and pulled Frank away back to their cauldron.

"Right, class. Can you hush for a moment please?" called Professor Dent, who was stood in front of his desk. "With the exception of a few people – " he looked warily at Remus and Peter's cauldron, which had a sticky, cement like substance in it (presumably Peter's fault) and Charlotte and Sirius', which had a sticky, black substance in it, which had been abandoned by the two of them, who were both fussing over Sirius' fingers. I grinned as I realised that Sirius could have sorted out his fingers in a second with a quick charm. " – you have all produced fairly satisfactory potions. For next lesson, I would like a foot long essay about the importance of adding ingredients to a potion in the correct order."

The bell rang loudly through the dungeon, and everyone hurriedly began to pack away their equipment and books, eager to get to lunch.

Lily and I had already packed away so we just stood at our table, watching everyone else. I gestured at her and then the door wordlessly, and with a glance at Alice, who was busy flicking water from the running tap at Frank, she nodded, and we walked alone out of the dungeon.

"Shall we go to lunch then?" I asked nervously, once we were outside of the classroom. "Everyone else might be a while."

"Sure. Let's go."

And with that, _Lily Evans_ and I went alone to lunch.

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**A/N I just realised that Lily and James' teacher would be Slughorn, but let's pretend he doesn't exist :)**

**Please review!**


	9. Mashed Potato

**A/N Woo, first day of my summer holidays! Anyways, hope you enjoy the chapter, please review :)**

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Chapter 9 – Mashed Potato

The Gryffindor table was still pretty empty when we arrived at the Great Hall and there wasn't any sixth years present yet, due to the fact that they were still cleaning up the dungeons. I had a feeling that having Potions class straight before lunch this year wouldn't be too popular with the sixth years.

Lily and I sat down on an empty bench and began to fill our plates. I looked around the hall, smirking slightly, glancing at all the surprised faces at all the tables, teacher's table included. Lily realised what I was looking at and laughed.

"They seem a little surprised, don't they," she said casually, piling food onto her plate.

"They have reason to be. I'm sure they all remember the time you used your wand to shoot a full plate of mashed potato at my face in front of the entire school."

I winced as I remembered the incident. It was halfway through fourth year, after I had asked Lily out for the seventh time in one day. That wasn't even the worst time. I think the all time record was seven_teen_.

"Oh, yeah. That was funny," she said, looking fondly down at the potatoes, beginning to pile them onto her plate.

I gulped, and Lily looked at me, grinning.

"It was _not_ funny! I wonder how you'd like a face full of mash!" I said indignantly, eyeing her plate warily.

"Relax, James. I'm too hungry to waste these potatoes on you, no matter what ridiculous way of trying to seduce me you come up with," she teased.

"I've given up on that now, Lils," I informed her, not completely honestly. "You're just a girl who can't be seduced."

I was sure I saw Lily's smile falter before she hastily began to grin once more.

"Just not by you, James. I prefer a guy who _doesn't _ask me out every five seconds."

"Oh, yeah?" I said, unhappily. "Who's this guy then?"

Lily rolled her eyes. "I meant it metaphorically, Jam Pot. There is no guy."

"Oh," I mumbled, dejected. There was no guy. That meant she didn't like me. You know, in _that_ way. But at least it she didn't like any other guy.

Before I could continue, Lily turned her head to look at the people who had begun to stream into the Great Hall, all of them looking disgruntled and grumpy. Among them was Snape, who looked the most disgruntled of them all. I have no idea as to why – he got out of the class at the same time as almost every one else, but he looked a lot more unhappy than the rest of them. I caught his eye as he began to walk down the hall towards his little gang of knuckle-headed Mini-Deatheaters, who were far too dumb to make it through to Advanced Potions. As he looked at Lily and I, he glared at me, sadness in his eyes that even I could recognise.

I really couldn't see why Lily even talked to Snivellus. I watched her as she gave him a small wave before turning to greet Alice and Frank, who were walking towards us. I, however, kept my eyes on Snape, who returned the wave hesitantly, eyeing Avery and Mulciber, the Slytherins he was walking towards. Filthy twat. He was ashamed of being seen associating with Lily. It should be the other way around – Lily ashamed of being friends with a greasy bastard like him.

He sat down at the table, and greeted his friends with a distracted air, not unlike myself, in fact - I was watching Snape intently when Remus and Peter said hello to me grumpily as they sat down next to me. I couldn't understand why Snape was looking so depressed. Out of everyone in Potions, he should have been the person who was most happy about having to stay behind after the bell. He was a Potions freak, after all.

I pulled my eyes away from Snape, and turned back to Lily. She was engaged in a conversation with Alice, so I turned to my left and grinned at Remus and Peter.

"Where's Sirius?" I asked.

"Hospital wing," Remus replied. "He rather forcefully turned down my offer to fix his fingers myself, and let Charlotte escort him. He looked pretty happy when we saw him leave. We had to clean up for him as well, stupid bastard."

I laughed. "You guys were a long time. I thought that you'd better hurry up. Lily was taking all the mashed potato, and I had no one here to protect me," I moaned loudly, raising my voice.

As I knew she would, Lily heard me and turned around to stick her tongue out at me before piling her fork with potato, giving me a warning glare as she did so.

"She's taken all the mashed potato?" Peter said exasperatedly, looking around the table dejectedly.

"No worries, Pete. Have some of mine," I said, fighting the urge to laugh. "I've finished now anyway."

He smiled appreciatively, scooping my potato from my plate to his.

"So, how was lunch?" asked Remus, waggling his eyebrows suggestively, grinning.

I elbowed him in the ribs.

"Lunch was good. Until you morons showed up."

"Hear that, Pete? He called us morons!" Remus said with mock hurt.

"Well, not Peter." I replied thoughtfully. "Just you."

"I thought I was the amazing, deep, all-knowing Remus?"

"Nope. You're the annoying, dumb, all-idiotic Remus," I said, grinning.

"No, that's Sirius," Remus corrected me, also grinning.

"Yeah, I guess I described him pretty well there." I replied as Remus started to eat.

I sat there for the next ten minutes, waiting for Remus and Peter to finish eating. I didn't talk to Lily once, as she was in a conversation with Alice and I knew better than to interrupt. It felt strange now for me to be sitting with Lily, but not in a conversation with her. It felt natural to talk to her, the same as if she were Sirius or Remus - but that would be weird, due to the whole me being in love with her thing.

Alice, Frank and Lily got up earlier than Remus, Peter and I. The three of them said goodbye, before leaving the hall, presumably to go walk around the grounds before the afternoon lessons. I waved goodbye sadly as I watched Lily leave, wishing Remus and Peter could have hurried up so we could leave with them.

I glared at Remus.

"What?" he said innocently, his third cheese sandwich on the way to his lips.

"You know what! If you didn't have to eat so much damn food, we could have left with them!" I whined.

"Hey!" he exclaimed defensively. "I'm hungry."

"I've noticed."

"Well, it's not my fault that we're so late to leave. If _someone _hadn't messed up our potion – " he turned to look pointedly at Peter. " – then we wouldn't have been late to lunch!"

"What are you two girlies fighting about then?"

I looked up to see Sirius standing by the table; all of his fingers still intact and no longer resembling sausages.

"Oh, you've decided to join us then, have you?" Remus said indignantly, forgetting about our argument. "I had to get all of that crap out of the bottom of your cauldron, while you were flirting with a girl!"

"Snogging, not flirting."

Remus gasped. "Sirius! You didn't! Wasn't the first time you talked to her today?"

"Yeah? So?" Sirius snorted, flopping down into Lily's recently vacated seat.

"So, don't you think you should get to know her first before you start snogging her? I bet you didn't even go to the hospital wing, did you?" Remus moaned.

"No, of course I didn't," Sirius scoffed. "What do you think I am, an idiot? I just fixed my fingers myself when we were out of the dungeon and went off to find a deserted classroom to snog in. Duh."

Remus rolled his eyes, but didn't reply.

"Who do you think you are, anywa? My mother? Actually, my mother would completely blow up if she found out I was 'fraternising with a half blood' like Charlotte."

"Stop bringing your mother into all of our arguments Sirius!"

"Oh, crap, did I do that already today? Sorry. Anyway, shut up with your moaning Moony, and let me talk to Prongs. I saw Lily when I was walking in here, and she and Alice were talking rather enthusiastically, and I swear I heard your name James. The Plan totally worked, mate, she's definitely into you."

"You think?" I said excitedly.

"Definitely."

"You're only saying that so that I'll stop moaning at you," interrupted Remus bitterly.

"She might actually like me, you know!" I said indignantly to Remus.

"I know she might do. But, just… don't get your hopes up James." Remus said hesitantly.

"Don't get my hopes up? What's that supposed to mean?" I said loudly.

"Well, I know that it seems like she likes you, but maybe she just wants to be friends for now." Remus explained cautiously.

I glared at him, before turning away and looking at Sirius.

"So, what were Alice and Lily saying?" I asked eagerly.

"I'm not sure mate, but I think it was something positive. They stopped talking straight away when they saw me, you see, so I didn't hear much."

"Oh, okay," I replied, still ignoring Remus, who was tapping me on the shoulder, tying to get me to turn around.

"So, are you going to make a move?" asked Sirius excitedly.

"No! Not yet, anyway. I want to be completely sure she likes me first. I know that it'll completely ruin our friendship if she doesn't want to go out with me, and I know I won't be able to fix it this time."

"Yeah, I guess. I don't see why Evans has to be so stubborn. She's not like any of the girls I've ever dated."

I snorted. "Yeah, well Lily wouldn't kiss a guy on the first day that she – WHAT DO YOU WANT REMUS?"

I turned around, finally giving in to Remus' prods.

"I just wanted to say sorry. For not being supportive and all that. I'm sure Lily does like you," he said apologetically.

"Oh, it's fine," I said, giving Remus a pat on the shoulder. "I know you were only trying to be helpful."

"Yeah, I was. I meant it in a nice way, I swear –"

"Will you two girls shut up and give me some of your mashed potato? There's none left."

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**A/N Did you like it? Hate it? Please leave a review!**


	10. Pottle and Snare

**A/N Sorry for the wait! I wrote an especially long one to make up for it :D Thanks for all the reviews I've been getting, I really appreciate them. Twenty people have this story on alert, so I assume twenty people are reading this… please review, everyone!**

**Nathpollen, I've thought about your comments, and they were in the back of my mind writing this chapter. I hope this one is better :)**

**Enjoy the chapter!**

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Chapter 10 – Pottle and Snare

Once Sirius had eventually finished his dinner, there was only ten minutes of lunchtime left before afternoon lessons began. Deciding not to try and find Lily – I didn't want to seem too eager – I stayed in the Great Hall with Sirius, Remus and Peter.

When the bell rang for the next period, the four of us were the only people still in the hall – except for Snape. He was sat alone at the Slytherin table. As our eyes met, he hurriedly looked back down at the Daily Prophet lying open on the table.

I nudged Sirius as we stood up to go to our next lesson. "Look at Snape. How dumb does he think we are? It's obvious he's just been sat there eavesdropping."

Sirius laughed. "Why would he? All we've been talking about is Quidditch and girls, neither of which he gives a fuck about."

I shook my head, unconvinced. "Why else would he stay at the table, alone, after finishing his lunch ages ago?"

"Snape's mind works in mysterious ways, Prongs. He's a weirdo, end of."

I didn't reply, but I was deep in thought as we left the hall, closely followed by Snape. I suddenly remembered the look Snape had in his eyes when he saw Lily and I, and how he had looked depressed ever since. Why the hell would he care that Lily and I were getting along now?

Then it hit me.

"Remus," I said quietly, turning around to check that Snape wasn't in earshot. "Y'know how Lily and Snivellus are friends? Well, you don't think he… likes her?" I muttered, a sick feeling in my stomach.

Remus looked at me in surprise, then narrowed his eyes, obviously thinking.

"It would explain a lot," he said dubiously, his brow furrowed. "But it seems unlikely."

"I know it does," I replied impatiently, raising my voice. Sirius and Peter were also listening now, and Sirius looked at me sceptically.

"This isn't about what you said before James is it? About him eavesdropping?" asked Sirius, one of his eyebrows raised. "You think he wants to know what Lily thinks of you?"

"Yes! That's exactly it!" I replied, almost shouting by this time.

"Well, he won't get that from us. We don't have a clue either," he chuckled.

I clutched at my hair in exasperation. "It's not funny!" I said dramatically. "What if Lily likes him back?"

"Yeah," Sirius snorted. "That's gonna happen – when hell freezes over. You're talking a load of shit, mate. No one would ever fancy Snivelly. Ever."

Before I could reply, Remus interrupted. "James, just calm down. Of course Lily doesn't like Snape."

"Yeah," said Peter timidly. "Who would go out with Snape when they could go out with you?"

Sirius snorted. "James, if it doesn't work out with Lily, I think you have an admirer here."

"I didn't mean it like that!" Peter protested, turning red.

"It's fine, Peter. We don't mind if you're gay. I've always had my suspicions…" he replied, smirking.

"I'm not gay!" Peter insisted. Sirius only shook his head knowingly, patting Peter on the shoulder.

"Denial."

Peter turned to Remus and I for support, but we were both trying not to crack up. I was biting my lip to stop a laugh escaping, my worries about Snape evaporating. Remus took a deep breath, and tried to wipe the grin from his face.

"Come on Sirius, stop teasing Pete," Remus said, his shoulders shaking with laughter.

"Ooh," replied Sirius, his face deadpan. "Is someone jealous? You got a little crush on Peter, Remus?" Remus stopped laughing and opened his mouth to protest, but Sirius continued. "I'm feeling a little left out here. No one has a gay crush on me. Unless your proclamations of love for Evans are just a cover, James?" he said, faking sincerity.

"Nah. You're not my type." I said with a smirk. "Maybe Snivellus has been hiding his secret love for you though? Shall I ask him?"

Sirius stopped dead in his tracks, his expression truly serious. "You say one word, you die? Understood?"

"Don't like it when the tables are turned, huh?" I replied, grinning.

"No, I don't! None of you are gay, okay? Happy now?"

"Ecstatic," replied Remus as Peter nodded.

"As much as I've been enjoying your ramblings," said a sneering voice from behind us. "Can you move, Black, so I can get to class?"

Sirius turned around, his features hardened, with a glint in his eye.

"Is there a problem, Snivellus?"

"Yes. You're it. Move."

"Make me," Sirius replied, pulling out his wand. I did the same, albeit a little reluctantly – I'd made a vow to myself to try curse Snape a little less often. Yet, here I was, my wand pointed at him on the first day of lessons.

"Believe me, I will," Snape replied.

Sirius smirked. "Do your worst."

Before Snape could even lift his wand, Professor McGonagall walked up behind us.

And boy, did she look mad.

"Snape, Black, Potter, what on earth do you think you are doing? Put those wands away at once," she commanded, her lips thinner than ever.

The three of us immediately shoved our wands back in our pockets, Sirius and Snape still glaring at each other.

"Twenty points from Slytherin, Snape, and forty from Gryffindor!"

"But that's not fair!" I protested. "Why do we get forty off?"

"There are two of you," McGonagall replied simply.

" I wasn't even doing anything!"

"You had your wand out, Potter. There is to be no magic in the corridors, and NO FIGHTING! I thought you three might have learnt from last year that I have no tolerance for fighting between the three of you, or anyone else for that matter. So get to class, all five of you, and sharpish!"

"Yes, Professor," we all mumbled, hurrying down the corridor.

Once we were out of earshot, Sirius turned to Snape.

"Thanks a bunch, Snivelly. You just made us get forty points taken off of Gryffindor. You must be so proud."

Snape shot Sirius a look that would curdle milk, but ignored him. We walked in silence along the corridor, Snape slightly in front of us. We were at least five minutes late to class by now, but we only had History of Magic with Professor Binns. He still called me Jacob Pottle, so I doubted whether he'd notice I wasn't there.

"By the way, Black," called Snape from a couple of feet in front of us. "I do have a huge crush on you. I just can't hide it anymore."

He smirked evilly at us and raised his eyebrows.

"And Potter, you can stop worrying," he continued. "I would never fancy a Mudblood."

Remus pulled me back as I moved towards Snape, prepared to punch the living daylights out of him. Firstly, he was listening to our conversations. Secondly, how fucking dare he call Lily a Mudblood?

"I thought she was meant to be your friend, Snivellus," said Sirius, glaring at Snape.

Snape didn't know how to reply to this, and he had the grace to look ashamed.

"Yeah," Sirius sneered. "You _should_ be ashamed."

Snape's expression became fierce once again, and he turned to me. "She'd never go out with you though, Potter. All she does is complain about you. Even if she is a… muggleborn, she's too good for you."

"Say that again," I said threateningly, getting closer to Snape until we were almost nose to nose.

"I'll spell it out – Lily. Hates. You."

Less than a second later, Snape was hanging in the air from his ankle, my wand still pointed at him.

"How fucking dare you, Potter," he snarled. "That's my spell."

"I borrowed it. That okay?" I said sweetly, putting my wand back into my pocket for the second time.

"No," he replied.

"Tough."

And with that, I walked into our classroom, which was less than a foot away, a smirking Sirius, Remus and Peter not far behind.

"Mr Pottle," wheezed Professor Binns as soon as I entered the class. I was surprised he'd noticed we'd come in, until I realised that we had been making a fair bit of noise outside. "And Brack, Luben and Pettifer. Would you care to explain why you are all late?"

We could hear faint shouts from outside the door, as could the rest of the class. The four of us looked at each other. No one spoke, so Professor Binns asked again.

"Well? Why are you late? I don't have all the time in the world you know, so kindly hurry up and explain."

I was about to explain that, as a ghost, he did in fact have all the time in the world, but I realised that Professor Binns wouldn't take too kindly to that.

"We just lost track of time, sir," said Remus apologetically.

"Just lost track of time?" repeated Binns. "That's a rather feeble excuse. And do any of you know where Mr Snare is?

The rest of the class peered around the door that Peter was holding open. He hastily slammed it shut so Snape was hidden from view, but muffled shouts could still be heard. Everyone (apart from, apparently, Professor Binns) could hear the noise and I bet everyone knew who was outside. Most people grinned appreciatively.

I looked around for Lily's face. At that moment, it could've rivalled McGonagall's.

"I have no idea where _Snare_ is. Maybe he's just…hanging around," said Sirius, grinning. The rest of us, including the class, rolled our eyes.

"Fine, fine. Just sit down, all four of you. I actually have a class to teach, you know, and they are waiting for me to continue my explanation of events in the twentieth century!" He looked back down to the notes in his hands. "During the Goblin Rebellion of 1962…"

As Binns droned on, the four of us sat down in our seats at the back of the room.

"_Hanging around_?" I whispered incredulously to Sirius as we sat down. "That has to be the worse joke I've ever heard."

"Agreed," whispered Remus, taking out his quill.

"Well, that's what he's doing isn't he?" Sirius protested. "Nice one, by the way Prongs. Levicorpus…hitting him with his own spell…classic."

"Don't you two feel a little…bad?" asked Remus as he began to take notes.

"No! You heard what he was saying!" I replied.

"Yeah, I know he was being a jerk, but now he's going to miss his lesson. And all the blood is probably rushing to his head, then he'll pass out, then he'll die – "

"Merlin, Moony. Are you sure all your blood hasn't rushed to _your_ head? Calm down! He'll be fine." Sirius replied calmly.

Lily spun around in her chair and threw a piece of parchment at me. Surprised, I picked it up.

_Potter, you better tell me what's been going on, or I swear I'll jinx you right here._

Are we back to Potter?

_Yes, until you tell me why you cursed Severus._

Because he was being a prick!

_Narrow it down._

I can't tell you.

_Why not?_

Because… it involves you.

_TELL ME NOW, POTTER!_

Well, it's a long story. But basically, he told me you hated me.

_And why the hell did that mean you cursed him? Him saying it doesn't make it true!_

So, it's not true?

_It used to be. Not anymore though. But right now, you're not one of my favourite people!_

You don't hate me though?

_No! But I wish you wouldn't go around cursing all my friends._

That's a slight exaggeration. I've only ever cursed one of your friends, even though it's happened a couple of times.

_A couple? MORE LIKE A HUNDRED TIMES!_

Ooh. I can feel your anger, and we're not even talking.

_Stop messing around James!_

Good, it's James again now?

_It is if you go outside, let Severus down, and APOLOGISE!_

No fair! He has to apologise too!

_I'll make him apologise later, just go let him down!_

Okay, I'm going, I'm going.

I chucked the parchment to Lily to read before carefully moving back my chair and standing up. Sirius looked at me quizzically, but I just shook my head at him and walked towards the door. Thankfully, Professor Binns kept droning on and was oblivious to the fact that one of his students had just walked out of the classroom.

I shut the door quietly and walked over to Snape.

"Come to gloat?" he said when he saw me.

"No, to let you down. And to apologise."

Snape looked surprised and raised his eyebrows. "James Potter? Apologise?"

"Yes. I'msorryileftyouhanginghereandiusedyourownspellonyou," I garbled.

"Sorry?" smirked Snape. "What was that?"

"Don't push it," I warned. "I'm sorry, okay?"

"Fine. Now let me down?"

I pulled my wand out and cast the counter-curse. Snape fell to the floor with a thud.

"Ow," he moaned. "Thanks for the soft landing."

"Oh, I am sorry. I left my mattress and pillows in the classroom."

Snape looked like he was about to laugh, but thought better of it.

"For what it's worth…I'm sorry too. Maybe Lily doesn't hate you anymore," he said quietly.

"No. She doesn't." I said confidently. "Anyway, we should get back in. What're you gonna tell Professor Binns? He asked us where _Snare_ was."

"I won't tell him anything. I'll just skip, class is nearly over."

I looked at him in surprise. Snivellus, not take up a chance to get me into trouble?

"Oh. Well, thanks I guess." I said nonchalantly. Me, saying sorry AND thankyou to Snivellus in one day?

"Whatever. You guys have already lost enough points."

"You got that right," I snorted.

"Potter…" he said hesitantly, his tone suddenly serious. "If you do go out with Lily… treat her right. Okay?"

I just nodded, dumbfounded, as he walked off down the corridor.

I pushed open the classroom door slowly, still thinking about Snape. Maybe he's actually… decent?

I walked into the classroom and slipped back into my seat, Binns still completely oblivious. Lily looked at me, scribbled something on another bit of parchment and threw it to me.

_Where is he? What did you do to him?_

Relax, Lils. He just decided to skip class. I brought him down, and we had a nice little chat. I think he may have given us his blessing, by the way.

_What? Given us his blessing? What on earth are you talking about James?_

Erm… never mind. Didn't mean to write that.

_Okayyyy. You're one strange kid, Jam Pot._

Strange kid? I'm only fifty-seven days younger!

_Wow. You worked that out fast. And how do you know when my birthday is?_

Of course I know when your birthday is. I pay attention.

_I'm impressed :)_

I'm impressive.

_And modest, too._

Ouch. That hurt.

_Ooh. Papercut? :P_

You're funny!

_I try._

Anyways, shouldn't you be paying attention and taking notes, or whatever it is Lily Evans does in History of Magic?

_Correction – what Lily Evans USED to do. From now om, Lily Evans passes notes to her friend Jam Pot. Far more entertaining. _

We're friends?

_Of course, you prat._

Oh. Good :)

_Now, let's stop being soppy and talk about important stuff. _

Like?

_Like… when were you planning on telling me about Remus being a werewolf?_

HOW DO YOU KNOW? WHO TOLD YOU? HOW LONG HAVE YOU KNOWN? WHO HAVE YOU TOLD?

_Now who needs to calm down?! Number one – I'm clever. Number 2 – Nobody. Number three – Since the end of last year. It was obvious. You were never around at the full moon, and you kept going on about his 'furry little problem'. And number four – Nobody, of course. _

Wow. You're a clever little witch, Lily.

_I thought we've established I'm fifty-seven days older? Therefore, you can hardly describe me as little. And thanks. _

Aw. There goes the bell. I was having fun, too.

_Walk me to Transfiguration? I'm happy for them, but Alice and Frank are acting really lovey-dovey, and frankly, it makes me feel slightly sick And I don't wanna play gooseberry. _

Sure, who in their right mind wouldn't want to escort a pretty girl to Transfiguration class?

_There were so many bizarre things about that sentence; I won't even start to list them. We're the last in here, and I'm sure you don't want to be late for your third class in one day. So let's go._

_I couldn't care less if I was late again. But whatever, let's go._

Stop passing me notes and talk to me! We're stood right next to each other!

_Fine!_

Stop then!

_Why don't you? We're walking out the door now, just talk to me!_

Why didn't you say that instead of writing it?

_Arghhh!_

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**A/N In case you're the dimmest person alive and didn't realise this, Lily wrote in italics, and James just normal. I'm pretty proud of this chapter :) Please review and let me know what you thought!**


	11. Confusions and Decisions

**A/N Thanks for all the reviews, please keep 'em coming!**

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Chapter 11 – Confusions and Decisions

I let Lily have the last word - or, last message-on-the-parchment – and just put the piece of parchment in my bag. The two of us talked animatedly all the way to class, bouncing quickly from subject to subject, such as the weirdest Every Flavour Beans we've ever had (salt for her, and mustard for me) and our favourite classes (Lily's is Charms, and mine is Transfiguration).

As we entered the classroom, I saw Sirius, Remus and Peter sat in a row of desks near the back, and Frank and Alice sat with a spare seat beside them in the front row. I cursed quietly to myself, before turning to Lily.

"Looks like you're sat up front then," I said, trying to keep the disappointment off my face.

"Oh. Um, I suppose I'll have to go…" she said, trailing off. She looked as if she wanted to say something else, but decided against it. With a small smile, she hurried off the front of the classroom, and took the spare seat next to Alice.

"Thanks," I said sarcastically as I took the seat at the end of the row, by Remus.

"For what?" Remus replied, narrowing his eyes.

"For sitting as far away as possible from Alice and Frank!" I said exasperatedly, as if I was stating the obvious.

"So?" asked Remus, bewildered. "I know Frank is our friend and everything, but you're never usually that bothered - oh!" he said, a look of understanding finally dawning on his face. "Well, you can have one lesson without being near her, surely? You've been doing it for the past five years."

"That's not the point! I just wouldn't have minded sitting a bit nearer to her, that's all," I snapped.

Remus opened his mouth, presumably to ask why, but he closed it again, sensibly deciding to leave it. I'm not even sure myself why I wanted to sit closer to Lily – we were in Transfiguration, and there was no way McGonagall would have let us talk anyway. I just kind of liked being near, so that I could always see her. Not in a scary, obsessive way, just to be able to look at her. I couldn't really make sense of it in my head, so I stopped trying.

"Class!" At the sound of Professor McGonagall's voice, the classroom became silent. "Welcome back to Hogwarts for your sixth year," she continued, not in a voice I found to be particularly welcoming. "Today is an extremely important year for you all. As you well know, next year is your NEWT year, and the year will be spent revising the topics you have covered from your first to sixth.

"Therefore, this is the last year to be spent learning new topics, and I expect all of you – " she looked around the room, making eye contact with every single student, her eyes lingering for a moment longer on Sirius. " - to work your very hardest – BLACK, stop that immediately unless you are looking for a detention!"

Everyone swivelled round in their chairs to see what exactly Sirius was doing, but he merely put his hands under the table and shrugged innocently.

"As I was saying," McGonagall continued. "You must all try hard this year to reach your full potential. Homework will now be set every class, and I will expect all of you to complete it before the next lesson – I WILL NOT TELL YOU AGAIN BLACK, STOP PUTTING THOSE IN GRIFFIN'S HAIR!"

"Ol' Minnie… such a ray of sunshine," Sirius grumbled as they walked out of the classroom.

The lesson had dragged on for hours, even for me, and Transfiguration is my best subject. Most of it had been spent on a forty-five minute long lecture from McGonagall, and the rest on reading the first chapter of "Tricks for Transfiguration" – sounds like an interesting book? Yeah, it's not.

"Well, you can hardly blame her," replied Remus as we walked out into the crowded corridor. "You were putting flobberworms in Jonathan's hair."

Sirius made a noise that sounded halfway between 'pah' and 'pfft', before turning to Remus. "So? And I would have gotten away with it if Minnie hadn't busted me! When she said that, Jonathan shook his hair and they all flew off his head and onto my desk!" he complained.

"Poor you," I said sarcastically, speaking for the first time since the start of Transfiguration. "You should get Jonathan to apologise for being such a prick."

Remus and Sirius obviously recognised my sarcasm, and grinned, but it was lost on Peter.

"I agree James," he said seriously, stammering. "He should say sorry."

Sirius, Remus and I just rolled our eyes, used to comments like that from Peter.

"Why were you putting them all in his hair anyway?" Remus asked.

Sirius shrugged and wrinkled his noise. "Dunno. I was bored, and he was sat in front of me. I've never really liked him anyway."

"Why the hell did you even have flobberworms?" continued Remus, bemused.

"Nicked 'em from Care of Magical Creatures," he said cockily, rolling up his sleeves. "Thought they might be useful. I still have a load left, don't worry. I didn't waste them all on that Jonathan muppet."

"What could flobberworms be useful for?"

"I thought Snivellus might appreciate them. Add some worms to the dandruff and grease," he answered, smirking.

I chewed my lip, looking remarkably like Peter, and said, " I think we should maybe…" I paused. "Maybe, just… lay off Snape for a bit."

Sirius' eyes widened, and he clutched his heart as if I had said something earth shattering. "What? Lay off Snivelly? Did you eat a bad Pumpkin Pasty or something?"

I shook my head and said, a little louder this time, "No. I just think he doesn't deserve what we've been doing. He might be an idiot – "

"_Greasy haired_ idiot," Sirius interrupted. "Don't forget the greasy hair."

" – at times," I continued, pretending to not have heard Sirius. "But he's alright."

"Where's all this come from?" said Sirius, bewildered, realising I was serious.

"Well, you know before, in History of Magic, when I went outside -"

"Yeah, I wondered what you were doing."

"Stop interrupting! Well, I was going outside because Lily told me to let Snape down from the ceiling, so I did – "

"What? That was you? I figured he'd just found a way to let himself down!"

"STOP INTERRUPTING! Yes, it was me. Then, we started talking, and he doesn't seem like a bad guy after all, _even though_ he's Slytherin," I continued quickly as I saw Sirius open his mouth to protest.

"But he's so…" began Sirius, struggling to find the words. "… greasy!"

"I know, I know, the guy has some personal hygiene problems, but – "

"Please don't tell me you're about to say 'but it's what's on the inside that counts'," Sirius snorted.

"I might be a bit more mature now but I'm not a bloody girl," I replied, raising my voice.

"Glad to hear it," said Sirius patronisingly. "So, why _have_ you started the '_I Heart Snivellus Snape Fan Club_' then?"

"I swear Sirius, if you weren't my best mate you'd have a nice shiny black eye by now."

"James, calm down. Sirius, I think you should shut up before that vein pops out of James' forehead _completely_," said Remus sternly. "Now, James, why have you decided that you don't want to use Snape to practice curses on anymore?"

"I just don't think he's as much as a twat as we used to think. And, no Sirius, that's not because of 'what's on the inside'. And I think…" I trailed off, not sure of what to say.

"Yeah?" said Remus.

"I think he _does _like Lily, y'know, in _that_ way."

"And you're not mad about that, because…?" asked Sirius, one eyebrow raised.

"Well, if you'd have let me finish," I complained. "I could have told you that I don't mind because A, I'm pretty sure Lily doesn't like him like that, and B, because… well, it's Snape. He's not going to do anything about it," I continued, shrugging.

By this time, we were already out on the grounds, walking towards the same tree we always sat at before dinner, and the same tree we had sat by during break.

Sirius looked a little shocked, and continued to look at me sceptically.

"Sirius. Just drop it," warned Remus.

"It's not like I'm saying you have to be best mates with him, Padfoot. Just… civil," I sighed. "It's just… Lily will never even consider me if we're still cursing one of her best friends daily. Just imagine it – I'm holding hands with Lily, walking to class, then you and I start shooting curses at Snape. She won't take too kindly to it."

Sirius grumbled something incoherent before stopping abruptly when we reached the beech tree.

"Is this grass taken?" he asked loudly, raising his eyebrows.

Alice and Frank sprang apart quickly, removing their hands from each other's waists. Remus elbowed Sirius in the ribs and tried to lead us away.

"No, it's alright," Alice called after us just as we were turning around to walk away. "Sit."

We obliged, Sirius winking at Frank as he did so. Frank grinned sheepishly back.

"So…" I began, my tone light to try and hide my eagerness. "Where's –"

"Lily?" finished Alice, smirking. "She said she wanted to go somewhere to think about stuff. She went down to the lake."

"Oh," I said, my disappointment clear.

"Didn't you hear me? She's down at the lake. Alone," repeated Alice, eyeing me pointedly.

"Yeah… I heard you. I'm not dumb," I replied, confused.

"Clearly you are, mate," interrupted Frank, patting my shoulder sympathetically. "Get off your arse and get down to the lake."

"Oh," I said, finally understanding. "See you at dinner, then."

I grabbed my bag, stood up and hurried across the grounds. I was eager to talk to Lily alone again. Talking to her was amazing, but it was like a glimpse of what could possibly come. When I'm walking with her to class, I could be holding her hand. Instead of just _saying_ goodbye, I could show her with a kiss. I wouldn't have to look away if she saw me staring at her. I could sit next to her in class, every day. We could sit together in the common room until late, kissing, talking and holding hands.

Thinking about this made me excited - but it also made me sad thinking about what I was missing, and what I might never have.

I couldn't delude myself anymore thinking that Lily was bound to fall into my arms. I cringed as I thought about all the things I'd said in the past, all the things I'd done. I'd been a cocky twat and I knew it.

My thoughts carried me all the way down to the edge of the lake. Just as Alice had said, Lily was sat there, her feet dangling in the water. Her shoes and socks were next to her, as was her bag, which was open. She had a quill in her hand and a book on her lap. She was scribbling furiously and she didn't notice me as I walked towards her, her face screwed up in concentration. She was obviously lost in her thoughts.

I almost wanted to stand there without saying a word, just to watch her. She was so beautiful, and her hair caught the light just right and it was shimmering, in the way only Lily's hair could. I stood there, just for a spilt second longer – I realised how cross Lily would be if she knew I was watching her without her knowing I was there, so I decided to walk forward, pretending I'd only just arrived.

"Hey, Lils," I said casually.

She almost jumped out of her skin and her hand shook, drawing a line across the page with her quill. She snapped the book shut and looked up at me.

"Merlin, James. Give a girl a heart attack, why don't you?"

"Sorry." I grinned apologetically.

I kicked off my shoes and reached down to pull off my socks, almost falling in the lake in the process. Lily laughed at me as I steadied myself before rolling up my trousers and sitting next to her, plunging my feet into the water.

"What were you writing?" I asked curiously, wincing at the cold of the water. "Homework?"

"Not exactly."

She ignored my quizzical look and looked out at the water.

"Do you come here often?" I asked, cringing as soon as I'd said it. _Do you come here often? _It sounded like a cheesy chat-up line! "I mean – "

Lily laughed. "It's alright, James. And, yeah, I do. It's nice down here."

I nodded in agreement, following her gaze out onto the lake. We sat there in a comfortable silence for a while before Lily spoke again.

"How did you know I was here?"

"Alice told me. We saw her and Frank. They were…busy, but Sirius interrupted."

"Busy?" she repeated, laughing. "You mean snogging the hell out of each other?"

"Yeah. Same meaning when it comes to those two."

She laughed again. Her laugh was a nice noise – it was almost musical.

"Makes you sick, doesn't it?" she said, smiling.

"No, more jealous."

_Shit. SHIT! Why the hell did I say that? _I cursed to myself, eyes widening as I realised what I'd just said. The truth had slipped out before I could think.

Lily looked at me, her expression not changing. Her eyes locked onto mine, and I was staring deeply into her emerald green eyes, losing myself in them. And suddenly, I didn't regret saying it at all.

I couldn't say who moved first. But before I knew it, my lips were pressing on to Lily's gently, barely touching at all. I put my hands in her hair and slowly coaxed her mouth open, deepening the kiss. Our tongues danced around each other as I took one hand away from her hair and put it around her waist, pulling her closer to me.

The cold in my feet and the solid grass beneath me was gone. There was only Lily, and that was exactly the way I wanted it to stay.

All too soon, Lily pulled away, taking her hands from my cheeks where she had placed them moments earlier.

She stood up quickly, stumbling as she did so. I grabbed onto her arm so she wouldn't fall in the lake and stood up myself.

"Wha -?" I began, trailing off. "What… what's the matter?"

She pulled on her shoes and socks clumsily, and grabbed her open bag.

"I don't – Just… I'm confused. I don't know… I don't know what I want, what I'm doing," she stammered, her eyes filling with what could only be tears. "I _can't_ like you… you're – you're _Potter_!"

I felt like my heart was shattering inside my ribcage. That kiss… it was so amazing. But now – what was going on? I put my hand under her chin and gently lifted her head so she would look into my eyes. "Please. Stay with me, Lily."

"Just let me go… I – I can't do this," she stuttered, her eyes pleading. A single tear escaped from her eye, and it fell down her cheek. I put out my hand to wipe it away, but she stopped me before I could reach her.

"Lily," I said breathlessly. "Please."

She closed her eyes for a moment, before shaking her head. "Just give me some time, James. I need time. We've only been back at school two days… I just need time," she repeated, allowing the tears to fall.

Before I could say another word, she turned and ran away from me, up towards the school.

"Lily! Wait!" I called after her pleadingly.

She didn't turn back.

I cursed and ran my hands through my hair.

"Why?" I muttered to myself. "Why did she have to be the one I fell for? Why?"

My heart had never felt the way it did then. I'd had a taste of what I could have, and it was ripped away from me. Why was she crying? Was the kiss that bad?

I span on the spot, looking back to the place we had been sat only a few short moments earlier. It was then that I noticed the book. It had fallen off Lily's lap when we were kissing, and neither of us had paid it any notice. It was open on the first page, a page full of Lily's handwriting.

I walked over to it and bent down to pick it up. I was about to close it shut and put it in my bag to give back to her, when something jumped out at me.

My name.

I stood there for a moment, fighting a battle with myself. Part of me wanted to read it – what was Lily writing about me? But another part, the part I rarely listen to but probably should, was telling me different – I can't read it. What would Lily do if she found out?

After several moments of deliberation, one side won. You can probably guess which.

I sat down on the hard grass and began to read.

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**A/N Wow, that turned out longer than expected. Just in case you're wondering, this story is nowhere near over. There's plenty more to come, I promise!**

**This is going to be the last update for at least two weeks :( I'm going on holiday to Ireland, and there won't be anywhere I can get to a computer (let alone an internet connection). I'll try write some down on paper though, so that hopefully you'll get at least one update pretty much as soon as I get back. Sorry!**

**Ducky1414 – Thanks for those :) I'll go back and touch up the last chapter, although 'skeptically', 'realize' and 'apologize' are the American ways of spelling them. The way I've spelt it is the British way, so I'm not going to change that :D Thanks anyways!**

**Please review everyone!**


	12. Dear Diary

**A/N Finally, another chapter for you. I know the last chapter was a huge cliffie so sorry I had to keep you waiting for so long!**

**I've decided to split up what I've written – instead of the two chapters I had planned, I'm making it three (which means I can update faster) :) It also means the first chapter is pretty much just Lily's diary, except for the last part at the end.**

**So, read and review please! This chapter is short, but the next two will be longer. Enjoy!**

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Chapter 12 – Dear Diary

31st August

9.47 pm

_Dear Diary,_

_It's finally come! And not a day too soon, either. If I had to hear one more words from Vernon Dursley about drills, and makes of drills, and power settings of drills, and… you probably get the idea by now – I think my head might actually blow up. _

_Anyway, the start of the school year has finally (almost) begun! The train leaves at eleven tomorrow morning, and I'll be the first person on it, believe me. I can't wait to get back to the Wizarding World. I feel so constrained living as a Muggle again. I can't believe I lived for so many years, unaware of anything to do with wizards at all. Until I met Sev. I've hardly seen him in the holidays, even though he only lives around the corner. The last time I saw him, about two weeks ago, he started to tell me something about his parents. He clammed up pretty quickly though, and I never got to hear what he was going to talk about. _

_Enough about Severus. He doesn't like it when I talk about him, even just to a diary. I saw this notebook in a bookshop this morning and I had to buy it. I've always liked to write, even though I can never keep a diary going for more than a couple of days. _

_I wasn't even in the shop to buy a notebook. I was in there to buy some books – normal, Muggle storybooks, I mean. That's something I do miss when I'm at Hogwarts. Even when I was young, I'd devour a fiction book in a single session, and to not have access to Muggle books at Hogwarts is more than slightly annoying. It's become a tradition for Sev and I to go buy a load of books the day before school. I went alone this year, because Sev said he was busy._

_I've hardly seen anyone during the holidays. I met up with Alice and her family in Diagon Alley as usual to buy all of our supplies, and her Mum and dad took mine for a drink in the Leaky Cauldron. Even though they've been in to the Wizarding World six times now, my parents still talk about the hags and the goblins they saw in the pub for days afterwards. _

_Ugh. Just remembered I'll be saying James Potter again tomorrow. I've been trying to think of some more imaginative ways to reject him, but my mind's blank. I used to try and be kind, but he infuriates me like hell. I guess I'll just have to go for the average 'no-way-and-a-curse' type thing. I still don't think he's got the message yet. Idiotic prat._

_It's ten o'clock – I want to get an early night. Gotta wake up bright and early tomorrow!_

1st September

8.30 pm

_Dear Diary,_

_I'm here, I'm finally here! It's just the same as I remembered, and it's so nice to be able to do magic again. My seventeenth birthday can't come any faster!_

_Whoa, the strangest thing just happened. I was sat here in the common room, writing in this and chatting to Alice when Potter and his cronies came through the portrait hole. I braced myself for his declaration of love, or whatever other crap he had prepare, but it didn't come. It didn't freaking come! I've been in the same castle – or train actually, for the most part – as Potter for a whole twelve hours, and he hasn't asked me out once! All he said was, 'Oh, hey Lily', like he was surprised to see me! He was so nonchalant! Then he asked me if I had a good summer! Then went up the stairs! You can probably tell by my excessive use of exclamation marks that I'm surprised!! And he didn't try sit near me during the feast, like he always tries to do. It meant I actually got to eat my whole plate of food without having to waste it to throw at morons. I wonder if he doesn't like me anymore? Not that I care. _

_I can't believe I'm back at Hogwarts and instead of writing about something interesting, I'm writing about Potter. Potter, of all people! NOT very interesting._

_I loved seeing Alice again, and Frank, and all the other girls in my dorm. Speaking of Alice, STOP READING OVER MY SHOULDER. She's pretending not to look now…_

_I heard the juiciest thing today! Apparently, Alice cheated on Frank with Sirius Black in a broom closet!_

_Knew she was looking. But sheesh, don't ever annoy Alice. Her pinches really hurt!_

_She's making me come to bed now. Freaking hell, Alice's elbows are bony. I'M COMING, I'M COMING!_

2nd September

12.45 pm

_Dear Diary,_

_I can't believe this. I'm starting to not actually hate James Potter._

_It's unbelievable what one-day can do. Yesterday, I thought he was a prick with a capital P. Now…the P isn't so capital anymore. Merlin, I've been around James for one day and I'm stopped making sense. What I mean is, he's not as idiotic as I thought he was. Actually, he's pretty cool._

_Last year, I couldn't be around him for more than two minutes without becoming seriously pissed off. But today – it's embarrassing to say, but…I'm enjoying his company. He's nice (when he wants to be), he's funny (seriously, hilarious) and he listens to me when I'm talking – unlike most guys._

_We started talking after Muggle Studies, and he's just so fun to talk to. And he lets me call him Jam Pot, and he's allowed to call me Lils. I'd never tell anyone this, but I actually like it when he calls me Lils. He's the only person who's ever called me it, so, naturally, I told him I hated it, years ago. But I actually like it. I'll never tell him, though. _

_I don't know what's gotten into him. He used to be so obnoxious. Now, he doesn't big himself up all the time and make other people feel like something stuck on his shoe. _

_The most amazing thing is that he hasn't asked me out yet. Not once. Does that mean he's over me? I don't actually _care _but no one wants to feel… cast aside. I know, I used to moan about the constant go-out-with-me's, but if I'm honest, they used to make me feel good. At least someone liked me, even if it was James Potter._

_I've told all of this to Alice, and she actually thinks I'm falling for him! Pfft. Falling for James. Yeah, right._

3.30 pm

_I've fallen for James Potter. Shit. _

3.31 pm

_No I haven't._

3.33 pm

_Yes I have. I really, really have._

5.00 pm

_I can't believe this. I won't believe this._

_James Potter? The same person who used to cast moustaches on to the portraits? The same person who used to curse someone because they were there?_

_I can't like James. It's impossible. He's just too… James. But I think I do. For some inexplicable reason. Do you know what made me realise it? We walked in to Transfiguration and I realised I wouldn't be able to sit near him. And I realised I really wanted to. How pathetic is that?_

_I wrote those last three entries in my diary as soon as I sat down, pretending to take notes. And now I'm down by the lake, in the same spot where I always read my books. My feet are dangling in the water, but I'm not noticing the cold. _

_I'm trying to make sense of things. Right. Of course I don't like James. I'll admit it; he's not bad looking. Scratch that, he's pretty gorgeous. But that's never made any difference before. Now, though… I'm seeing him in a whole other light._

_LILY, SHUT UP! I'm not falling for James Potter, I'm not! I've only been back at school for one day. One, measly day. What difference can that make? It can't be enough to have changed my feelings for James. I won't let it. No way._

_This sounds strange; but I can still feel his presence. My arms are getting goose bumps, and my heart is beating faster. He's obviously not here, though. Could just thinking about him be enough to get my heart_

.x.

I stared down at the page, my eyes wide in shock. The line where she had crossed her last t had carried on across the page – the place where she'd jumped as I spoke behind her.

I sat there in silence for a moment, the diary still balanced on my knees. My arms started to get goose bumps and my heart was pounding in my rib cage – just as Lily had described. But when she had written it, I was actually behind her…

I turned around slowly, praying I was wrong.

But, of course, I wasn't wrong. There she stood.


	13. Consequences

**A/N Here's a fast update, as promised :) I'm sorry if the end of the last chapter was confusing – the non-italics was James' point of view again.**

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Chapter 13 – Consequences

I jumped up and the diary flew from my lap and fell with a splash in to the water. I stood in silence watching the book, and all her words, float down to the bottom of the lake. It seemed strangely symbolic, somehow.

I didn't take my eyes away from the water as I tried to think of something, anything to say. I couldn't believe what I'd done. I'd blown it. Blown _everything._

"I – I'm sorry," I choked out, too cowardly to look in to Lily's beautiful green eyes. That would've broken me down completely.

"You're sorry? You're sorry?" she repeated. "You read my diary, my private diary, and that's all you have to say? Who do you think you are?"

"I don't know _what_ to say," I whispered feebly.

"Well, forget everything you read, Potter. It doesn't mean anything, not anymore. And to think I kissed you!" She broke off with a quiet choking noise, almost like a sob.

"I didn't mean to read it," I protested, even more feebly than before.

"Oh! Well, that's okay then," she shouted hysterically. I flinched. "You didn't _mean _to, so that's okay. Do you think that would make things any better? Oh and, by the way, you owe me three pounds ninety nine pence for that notebook."

"Lils – "

"Lily. Lily."

"Sorry, Lily. I know that – that, I can't ask you to forgive me. But – "

"No Potter, you can't. So don't even try."

"Please, Lily. Please. I know I shouldn't have read it, but – I did. And I know you have to feel something for me. I read it and, it sounds so cheesy, but… I felt it, when we kissed. Just… please," I begged, walking closer to her. She backed away and was about to turn around when she stopped.

"You know what Potter? I did. I admitted I liked you. But you've ruined _everything_," she hissed, her eyes filling up with tears. "And do you want to know why I came back after I walked away? Because I needed less than five minutes to realise I was being stupid. I was going to come down here and kiss the hell out of you."

I closed my eyes for a moment, running my hand through my hair. What _could've_ been…

"But then I see you reading my diary," she continued. "Do you know how that felt?"

She opened her mouth to continue, but tears suddenly fell from her eyes and I knew she couldn't have spoken at that moment if her life had depended it.

"Lily," I began, my own voice cracking. "I am so, so, so sorry. I'll spend forever trying to make it up to you, if you'll let me. But…I can't watch you walk away from me again. Not again.

"Then don't watch," she choked out, letting the tears drip down her face. "I won't be coming back this time."

And I let her walk away. What else could I have done?

.x.

I couldn't face dinner. _Of course _I couldn't face dinner. I walked slowly up to the dormitory, hoping I wouldn't pass many people on the way. I sank down on to my four-poster, pulled the curtains around me and shoved the pillow on top of my face.

_How could I have been so stupid?_

Thoughts and pictures of Lily whirred through my brain as I lay there. That kiss, that amazing kiss…how I felt when she pulled away…the hurt when she walked away for the first time…and the magnified hurt when she walked away for the second time. But that time it was definitely my fault. All the pictures mashed up in my mind until the only one remaining was the one of the tears running down her face, and I knew how much she was hurting. I wanted to find the person who had made her hurt like that and curse them into oblivion. But that person was me.

I heard the creak of the door as the others entered the dormitory. They sounded high-spirited, obviously full of food after a hearty dinner. I lay there quietly, hidden by the curtains, not wanting to tell them what had happened yet.

"James?" I heard Sirius call loudly.

"Quiet," hushed Remus. "He'll be asleep."

"Why do you think he wasn't at dinner?" wondered Sirius, only a little quieter. "Maybe he and Lily lost track of time?"

I could practically hear him nudging Remus and winking suggestively, as I knew he would be from the tone of his voice. How very wrong he was.

"Maybe."

I could hear the three of them moving around the dorm as they got changed in to their pyjamas.

"Can't we wake him and ask?" whined Sirius after a few silent minutes.

"No! Just ask him in the morning. If he was _occupied _like you say, he won't want to talk to us just yet. He's not you, Sirus," Remus joked.

"Okay, okay," Sirius grumbled. The bed springs creaked to my right as he lay down on the bed.

"It might have been nothing, anyway," said Remus.

"Nothing?" said Sirius sceptically. "Would _nothing _make James Potter skip dinner? We are talking about the same James, right?"

"I think so," replied Remus. "Dark haired boy with glasses and an obsession with treacle tart and Lily Evans?"

"That's the one." There was silence for a few minutes. Remus was rolling around in the bed to my left but the others were still and slient.

"G' night," called Remus.

Sirius groaned. "Why do you _always_ have to do that? I'd have a good night if you stopped shouting good nights at us when Pete and I are almost asleep."

"Well, I _am_ sorry."

"Good. Now go to sleep and don't suddenly say 'See you in the morning' in the middle of the night, waking us all up."

"Sheesh, alright."

The room fell in to silence, broken only by Peter's loud snores after a couple of minutes.

I closed my eyes and Lily's face seemed to be burned in to the back of my eyelids. I couldn't get her out of my mind.

She was right in the start of her diary. I am a prick. World's biggest.

I slept restlessly through the night, the brief periods of sleep filled with nightmares. It was always the same, and my mind replayed it over and over. I suppose it wasn't really a nightmare – do things that have actually happened count?

Lily's face wouldn't leave me, even in sleep.

.x.

I woke with a start the next morning as Sirius ripped open my curtains.

"Wake up, sleepyhead!" he shouted in a camp, sing-song voice.

"Ugh," I groaned. "Shut up, piss off, and close the curtains. I'm staying here today, and you can't make me move," I moaned, trying to pull the curtains shut again.

Sirius resisted my weak attempts to close them and looked at me with a mix of mild amusement and surprise. He looked at Remus, who had come to stand next to him and pointed at me.

"Delusional," he said in a mock whisper, cupping his hand around his mouth. Remus elbowed him in the ribs and turned to me.

"What happened?"

"Something," I mumbled.

"Well, we sort of gathered that," said Sirius. "You don't normally greet us like that in the morning."

"I've ruined everything."

"You'll have to be a bit more specific," said Remus calmly, sitting down at the edge of my bed. Sirius followed suit, looking at me expectantly.

I sighed and sat up, pulling my covers off as I did so.

"Why are you still wearing yesterday's clothes?" asked Remus in surprise.

"Just because," I grumbled.

"Again with the specifics," sighed Sirius.

I took a deep breath. "You know how I went down to see Lily at the lake?" They nodded. "Well, we started talking and then… we kissed."

Sirius whooped and grinned. "I knew it, mate."

Remus looked at him in annoyance. "If that was the end of the story, would James be like this? No. Keep going, James."

"It was amazing. Absolutely amazing. But she pulled away and started saying how she couldn't do it, and she was confused."

Sirius' grin faded. "About what?"

"I don't know – well, I didn't at the time. Anyway, she left and I noticed she'd left her notebook and when I opened it I saw it was her diary…"

Remus moaned and ran his fingers through his hair in a distressed way. "James, you didn't."

"I did," I said gravely. "I read it."

"What did it say?" asked Peter curiously, who had woken unnoticed and was standing at the foot of the bed.

"Hey. That was my line," joked Sirius, trying and failing to lighten the mood. "What did it say?" he repeated eagerly. I almost laughed.

"It doesn't matter. I shouldn't tell you, anyway. It was bad enough that I read it, let alone telling you three.

"Then she came back and saw you?" said Remus. It was more of a statement than a question.

I nodded. "I jumped up and the book fell in to the lake and I tried to say sorry. It didn't make difference. She was crying, and I know how much I've hurt her. She'll never forgive me."

"Ah, James," sympathised Sirius. "Sorry, mate."

"Yeah. Me too," I replied.

"Me three," added Remus.

"Me four," said Peter.

We grimaced at each other, united. At times like these, if one Marauder was down, all of the Marauders were down.

"You can't give up, Prongsie. Marauders never give up," stated Sirius matter-of-factly after a moment.

"I think I'm going to have too this time," I replied. Remus smiled sympathetically, but didn't contradict me.

"No, you don't," Sirius insisted. "We've come up with loads of plans before, right? Let's just do it again. There has to be a way…" He broke off, staring in to space.

"I don't think so."

"We're Marauders, aren't we? Sirius' plans are legendary," he replied. "Just give me a day or so. I'll think of something."

"Okay, Sirius." I decided to humour him, although I had no doubt in my mind that I'd blown it.

The three of them managed to convince me to go down to breakfast, not that there was much convincing left to be done – I hadn't eaten since yesterday lunch time, and even broken hearted teenagers need to eat.

My stomach rumbled in agreement as we walked down the staircase in to the common room. As I reached the bottom step, I saw Lily do the same thing on the staircase to my right. She looked a little pale and she had circles under her eyes. She still looked beautiful, of course. I met her eyes and hesitantly began to walk over to her, Sirius' words ringing in my head, but she avoided me and walked out of the portrait hole.

It was only then that I saw Alice, who had been hovering at Lily's shoulder. She looked torn as to whether to talk to me – and she obviously had something to say – or to follow Lily. She chose the latter, giving a low wince as she walked past me. She obviously wasn't too mad at me, but I knew she'd heard all about my stupidity.

"What's up with Prewett?" observed Sirius.

"Can't you guess?"

"I suppose you weren't the only one telling a story this morning," said Remus as we began to walk through the halls.

"This morning?"

"Yes. Lily wasn't at dinner either, but Alice and Frank were. I think they got the wrong end of the stick, like Sirius. Alice looked particularly smug."

"Why wasn't she there, do you think?"

"Same reason as you, I guess. Wanted to be alone to think for a while. Thinking about you."

I sighed. "Why can't she just forgive me, then?" Remus opened his mouth to answer, but I spoke before he could. "Yes, I know – _it's not that simple_."

Remus shrugged apologetically, and I'd obviously said exactly what he was planning to say.

As we entered the hall I spotted Lily immediately. She was sat with Alice and a few other girls in her dorm, and I could tell straight away her conversation was forced. She tried to smile as one of the girls made a joke but the smile faltered as I walked past. She gripped her spoon with more force than necessary. Her hand was shaking a little over her bowl of cereal, and she tried to appear oblivious to the fact that I was walking by her.

I forced myself to continue walking, knowing that a confrontation in front of the entire school would make matters worse.

I ate my breakfast in a glum silence, only speaking when required. The people sat around us looked at me curiously, as silence from me was not exactly a common occurrence.

I pulled out my timetable to examine it when I'd finished my breakfast. _Transfiguration._ I realised quickly that I wouldn't be anywhere near Lily. I couldn't decide whether or not that was a bad thing.

.x.

The rest of the day trudged by in a slow blur. Almost all of my classes were ones I hadn't had yesterday, and Lily chose to sit as far away as possible. I tried to catch her eye, but it was useless – she completely ignored me.

The only other lesson we'd already had yesterday was History of Magic, in which Lily had no choice apart from to sit in her seat directly in front of me.

Five minutes in to the lesson I took the piece of parchment on which I was supposed to take notes and scribbled a message.

_Lily – please talk to me. Or write to me… I thought this was what you did now in this class?_

_Jam Pot_

It landed directly next to her right hand. She looked at it for a moment, clearly debating whether or not to rip it to shreds. She picked it up tentatively and wrote a reply, throwing it swiftly behind her. All without turning around. Not once.

_You're not Jam Pot anymore, Potter. Give it up. I'll never be able to trust you again, and how can I even be friends with you without trust? Leave me alone._

I didn't reply. What was the point?

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**A/N It was nice to write some Marauder conversation again. I've missed them (even though it's only been… two chapters. But that seems like a lot of time without some nice Marauder Goodness!)**

**Next chapter will be up very soon. Most of it is written already :) Review please? **


	14. Swelling Solution Again

**A/N Thanks for the reviews, everybody :) I hate sad James too, but it had to be done! Here's the next chapter…**

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14. Swelling Solution Again

The rest of the day passed in the same way as it had before History of Magic – time seemed to go slower than usual, especially when I was watching Lily, who was going out of her way not to catch my eye.

I went to bed straight after dinner, fed up of making conversation. We hadn't mentioned Lily again, and I assumed Sirius had forgotten all about his stupid 'plan' idea. I pulled the sheets right over my head, and tried in vain to fall asleep. It was at times like this I wished for a potion to clear my head, something that'd make everything disappear.

.x.

I didn't need to be coaxed out of bed the following morning, and I was awake before Sirius, Remus and Peter. I walked through to the bathroom and showered, before dressing quietly. I was pulling my jumper over my head as Remus sat up in his bed, yawning.

"Morning," he greeted me, pulling off his covers.

"Hey. I thought I'd wake up early – I'm sure it's going to be a fun day, I didn't want to miss any," I replied bitterly, running my hands through my hair.

Remus grimaced. Sirius woke at my words, and surveyed the room. "You woke me up."

"Sorry. It's nearly breakfast time, anyway."

"Ooh, goody. Someone wake up Pete so we can go down," Sirius replied, stretching. I shook Peter awake, and the three of them were soon showered and dressed.

The Great Hall was reasonably empty when we entered, and we chose our usual seats at the middle of the table.

"What've we got first?" I asked as I buttered my slice of toast.

"Potions," replied Sirius happily, without hesitation.

"Erm, yay?" I replied, confused. "We don't like Potions, remember Sirius?"

"Oh, but we do, my dear friend!" he replied jovially. "It's all part of the plan."

I groaned. "I thought you'd decided not to bother with a plan. There's no point."

"Ah, James. Your negativity saddens me!" I looked at him. Sirius _was_ acting strangely.

"What's wrong with you today, Padfoot? You're acting less like you, and more like…" I broke off, lost for words.

"Let him have his fun, James," said Remus. "He couldn't stop talking about the plan after you went to bed."

I groaned again. "What's the plan?"

"It's genius, if I do say so myself," boasted Sirius. "Pure genius."

"Well what _is_ it then?" I repeated impatiently. "You have to tell me so I can decide whether or not to bother doing it."

"But it's not up to you to decide, James!" said Sirius, clearly enjoying himself. "It has nothing to do with you whatsoever."

"So I don't have to do anything?"

"Not a thing. Your brilliant friends are taking care of it."

"But you won't make things worse?"

"How could I make things any worse?" he said, grinning. I wanted to argue, but he was right. Things couldn't get worse, whatever ridiculous scheme he'd come up with - and roped Remus in to.

"Can't you just tell me what it is?" I asked, admittedly a little curious now.

"No," replied Sirius certainly. "Definitely not. It won't work as well."

I turned to Remus, but he shook his head. "No. It's best you don't know."

I huffed and puffed a little more, but eventually agreed to let them do whatever they wanted – within reason. If there was the slightest chance it would make Lily just a tiny bit less mad at me, I was for it.

"Who's Charlotte going to go with in Potions, Sirius?" I asked after a brief silence.

"Me," he stated. I'd taken it for granted that Sirius would be my partner from then on in Potions, due to the fact that I knew Lily wouldn't go near me.

"Then who I am I going to go with?"

"Lily…" Sirius replied, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Haven't you noticed that Lily wouldn't be partners with me if I were the last person in the world?"

"Well, you will be. Not the last person in the world, but in the class. She'll have no choice," Sirius insisted.

I looked at him in disbelief. "Do you want me to lose the use of my limbs? Because that's probably what will happen to me if I'm partners with Lily."

"Don't worry. It's all part of the plan," Sirius tried to assure me.

"What? Losing the use of my limbs? I don't think that'll make Lily realise she can't live without me, Sirius."

"No, not that," Sirius sneered. "Working with Lily is all part of the plan. But don't ask about it any more, because I won't tell you," he ordered. "And neither will Moony!" he added sternly as I looked towards Remus.

"Fine," I grumbled.

We'd all finished our breakfast by this time, so we slowly made our way to the dungeons. As we walked of the hall, I saw Lily sat at the head of the table. She ignored me, of course.

We arrived outside of the classroom before the bell, but there were a few other people already there, comparing sheets of parchment.

"Oh crap," I cursed. "I forgot to do that homework he set last lesson."

"You and me both, Prongsie," replied Sirius, grinning.

"What are we doing about this lesson, then? Did he say while you were clearing up?" I asked, hoping that whatever potion it was wouldn't cause too much harm if splashed on a person. Namely me.

"Oh that's right, you don't know," said Sirius nonchalantly. "We're doing Swelling Solution again. He said some people needed the practise."

I groaned. "This _is_ going to be fun."

Professor Dent appeared at the doorway just as the bell rang and ushered us all inside.

"Don't bother sitting down at the desks," the professor called as we began to file in to the dungeon. "Just get straight into your partners from last lesson, and get the ingredients for a Swelling Solution, listed on the board."

I heard a moan from behind me and Lily appeared at my shoulder. "Go get the ingredients, Potter. I want to get this over with."

I did as I was told, and went over to the store cupboard as Lily set up a cauldron. I picked up everything listed on the blackboard before walking back over to Lily.

"Just do what you did last lesson," she ordered. "And I'll do everything else."

I wanted to say something, but I had no idea what I could possibly say – so I stirred the potion obediently in silence as she prepared the ingredients and added them to the cauldron at the correct order.

_Merlin,_ I thought as we stood there in silence. _This is torture. Just talk to her James, say something._

"I, erm…" I began. "I was wondering where I could get three pounds ninety nine from. To pay you back, I mean."

_Oh, jeez. Anything except for mentioning that diary._

She looked at me coldly. "Just give me two galleons."

I nodded and fished around in the pockets of my robes for some coins. I found two gold galleons and took them out of my pocket. I held out my hand and put them in to her own, touching her hand as I did so.

"Thank you," she said stiffly.

I nodded my head, and continued to stir the substance in the cauldron. It was navy blue, and I remembered from last lesson that this meant it was almost ready. I continued to stir and I looked at Lily. She was stood fairly close to me so that she could add the ingredients easily, and she was on my right hand side. She had her head bent and her hair fell over her face like a curtain as she chopped some roots. I tried to think of something to say, but words failed me.

I watched as Sirius walked towards our cauldron, whistling nonchalantly. I stood there expectantly, waiting for him to say something to me – but instead, he bashed in to me as he walked past, and turned around with a twinkle in his eye. My stirring arm jerked as he knocked me, and as if it was in slow motion, some of the smooth, navy blue potion splashed out of the cauldron and landed on Lily and I. Both of our exposed pairs of hands blew up like Sirus' had last lesson, and the spoon fell out of my hands.

"Black!" Lily yelled as she stared down at her hands, red in the face. "Look what you've bloody done!"

He stared at us with a blank expression on his face as both of us looked at him indignantly. "Oh, yeah. Sorry." He shrugged before walking back to his own cauldron with Charlotte, who was watching him, clearly perplexed - as was I. And pretty mad, too.

I followed him as Lily walked over to the professor, and pointed one of my huge fingers at his face. "Why the hell did you do that?"

He smirked. "You can thank me later."

I stared at him, bewildered. "Thank you? What would I thank you for? Making our hands blow up? I'm not really thankful for that, Sirius!"

"Prongsie, Prongsie, Prongsie," he said patronisingly. "Don't you understand? It was all part of the plan!"

"What are you expecting? Lily and I to bond over our equally large hands?" I said, raising my voice.

"Ah, you'll understand it soon enough. Now, go over to Dent. He's beckoning you," Sirius replied, indicating the professor and Lily.

I walked over to them, but not before shooting Sirius one last glare.

"Mr Potter. As I have told Miss Evans, my stock of Deflating Draught mysteriously disappeared late last night, along with the ingredients for making one. Quite unfortunate. Worry not, I will make sure the thief is punished accordingly."

_Oh, Merlin. I'm going to make Sirius pay._

"I'll be able to gather together the ingredients soon enough, but you'll have to spend at least the rest of the day in your common room," he continued. "I'll get the potion to you by dinner."

"Can't we just go about our day as normal?" asked Lily hopefully.

Professor Dent stared at her. "Are you joking, my dear girl? Have you seen your hands?"

Both of us looked down at our hands, and I noticed they'd expanded at least another fifty percent since I last looked. There was no way I'd be using them today.

"Okay fine," Lily agreed grudgingly. "I'll just go tell Alice."

Professor Dent looked at me apologetically, before walking over to Remus and Peter, who both looked red in the face and flustered as they stirred their potion frantically. I stalked over to Sirius, trying to look as menacing as I could with hands looking as mine did.

"Sirius!"

"Yes?" he said innocently.

"You stole all of Professor Dent's potion! AND all the ingredients to make a new one! So now I'm stuck like this ALL BLOODY DAY!"

"I know. It's genius, isn't it? Now you have to stay with Lily, in one place, the whole day!"

I paused. When he put it like that…

"Yeah," he said enthusiastically as he looked at my expression. "Good idea isn't it! Oh and by the way, when you want to use it, I hid the potion in a flask in my wardrobe. Have a good time," he said with a wink, before turning back to Charlotte, who was stirring their potion absent-mindedly, staring at Sirius.

I walked over to Lily, who was stood by Alice. I couldn't see her face, but I knew she wasn't in the best of moods.

"Ready to go?" I asked tentatively when I reached them.

"Yes," replied Lily haughtily. She walked over to the door, and I made to follow her before Alice pulled me back.

"Tell Sirius it's a good plan," she said with a wink.

"How did you know?" I asked, surprised.

"It was obvious," she snorted. "Now hurry up before Lily leaves without you."

I hurried over to the door, where Lily was trying to open it with some difficulty. She couldn't get a grip on the handle, and was becoming increasingly frustrated.

"Here," I said, hurrying over. "I'll try."

Unsurprisingly, I had no more luck than Lily. Eventually, Professor Dent opened it for us and let us out of the dungeon.

"I'll send the potion up to you at about six!" he called as the door swung shut.

"Great," muttered Lily as she began to march down the corridor. I had to hurry to keep up. "That means we're stuck like this for – " she looked down at her wrist, clearly expecting a watch. "Oh, crap. Where the hell's my watch?"

"I think it probably snapped when our hands expanded," I explained, laughing a little.

"It's not funny!"

"You have to admit Lily, it is a little funny. Look at the pair of us!"

I gathered from the death glare Lily sent me that she didn't agree.

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**A****/N Please leave a review!**


	15. Nice Place, That Godric's Hollow

**A/N Yes, I suck, I know. This update took much too long...but would you prefer a terrible chapter straight after the last one, or a good (hopefully!) chapter with a bit of a wait? I have an inkling that you guys will like this chapter, anyway Oh, and you should thank Nathpollen for sending me a PM urging me to update…it would've been a couple more days if I hadn't got it. So, here's the chapter, after all this rambling!**

**But a disclaimer first…I don't own _Harry Potter_ or the movie _Ghost _(you'll see…)**

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Chapter 15 – Nice Place, That Godric's Hollow

"_Hurry up_, Potter!"

Door handles seem a lot more slippery when you have hands that just don't want to cooperate. And my hands really didn't want to cooperate.

"Why can't we just use a spell?"

"I'm not exactly in the position to take out my wand, Potter. Are you?"

I looked down at my hands. Perhaps not, then.

"Maybe I should just break it down?" I suggested.

Lily looked at me in despair. "You're suggesting we break down every door from here all the way up to the seventh floor? Not that great a plan, Potter."

"Why don't _you _think of a way to get the door open then?" I said, annoyed. She opened her mouth to respond, but she stopped, clearly stumped. "Yeah. So, one of us should go back to the dungeon and get Professor Dent to send someone who'll walk up to the common room with us and open all the doors."

"I'm going to look ridiculous, going back in there," she replied. Nevertheless, she turned and began to walk back to the classroom just around the corner.

I leaned against the wall to wait, nearly burning my hair on a lit torch in the process. I could hear Lily huffing and puffing as she stamped down the corridor, muttering to herself. I'm fairly sure I heard the words 'that prat Black' at least once. There was silence for a moment, before she yelled 'Open the door, please!' and the dungeon door creaked open.

After a minute or two, she returned, Remus at her heel.

"Go on then, Remus. Do your thing," she said.

"My thing? My opening doors thing, you mean?"

"No, your ear waggling thing," Lily replied scathingly.

"Okay, okay. It's just never been my 'thing' before, that's all. Not exactly a party trick."

I laughed, but Lily looked at him sternly until he moved forwards to 'do his thing'. He opened the door with a flourish, and Lily and I trooped through it.

"Sorry about all this, James," said Remus in a low voice as Lily walked briskly up the corridor ahead of us. "I told Sirius it was a stupid idea, but – "

" – But when Sirius gets an idea in to his head, there's no getting it out," I finished, nodding knowingly.

Remus nodded. "We should give him credit where credit is due, though. I suppose Lily will have to spend the whole day with you. You know how proud she is, she won't let anyone else see her with her hands like that. Look at her now – she's practically running in case the bell rings and anyone sees her."

When we reached the next door, Lily was stood tapping her foot with her arms crossed over her chest. "Come on, Remus. Your services are needed again."

"Never fear, Remus is here!" I said, laughing. Lily and Remus rolled their eyes, and Remus opened the door. Lily stalked off again. It seemed she wanted to spend the smallest amount of time in my presence as possible, which wasn't what I was hoping for. There was still time for that to change, though. Lots and lots of time.

Well, things hadn't exactly changed two minutes later when we were on the third floor. Or five minutes later when we were on the fifth. Or even ten minutes later when we were right outside the common room, and Remus had returned to Potions.

"Godric's Hollow," Lily barked at the Fat Lady.

"Yes, nice place, Godric's Hollow," the Fat Lady said conversationally, waving around an empty wine bottle. "And Violet says Dumbledore himself used to live there when he was a – "

"Yeah, I'm sure it's really great. I might go visit one day. But for now, will you just let us in the common room?" I said.

"Just tell me the password, dears."

"I just did," Lily replied with gritted teeth. "Godric's Hollow. That's the password."

"Oh yes, of course. Gosh, I really shouldn't have drunk all that wine. Your hands look awfully funny to me. Well, anyway. I really should report you for being out of lessons, you know. Did you come here to get up to mischief?" she said with a wink.

"No. But we'd like to get in the common room, all the same," I said.

"Oh, of course, yes. Password?"

"Godric's Hollow!" Lily and I yelled together.

"Ah, yes. Nice place. Have a good time, dears," she slurred with another wink, swinging open.

"Great," Lily groaned after climbing through the portrait hall. "It'll be round the whole school by lunchtime that we're in here 'getting up to mischief'."

"She's too drunk to remember," I said. "She's more likely to tell people that Merlin himself visited her portrait to share a bottle of red wine."

Lily chuckled, but stopped laughing abruptly and sank down on to a sofa. "Aren't you going to go somewhere?"

"Like where?" I asked, my grin fading.

"Somewhere away from me. Like your dormitory. Or hell. Whichever."

"You don't mean that, Lils," I said, sitting down next to her. She glared, but didn't move to an armchair, as I expected.

"I'm Lily."

"No, you're Lils," I insisted, unsure where my thoughts were leading me. "You'll always be Lils."

"Never. I'm Lily," she refused, shaking her head adamantly. "Would you like me to spell it out? It's L-I-L – "

"To other people. Not to me, though. Or yourself. You wrote so in your diary – "

"Don't mention that stupid diary ever again, Potter."

"Why? Because you finally admitted in it that you liked me, and I messed it all up?"

"No, because I wrote _lies_," she hissed.

"It wasn't lies, Lils. I know it wasn't," I argued.

"What do you know?" she said scornfully, her voice faltering. She stood up quickly and I did the same. "It was all lies. I – I hate you, Ja – Potter."

"What do I know?" I repeated. And I decided I had to say it all, as cheesy or as corny as it was. It was now or never. "I know you like me, Lils. I know you want to forgive me. I know I'm sorry, really, really sorry. I know I'll never hurt you again. I know I really, really want you to forgive me. But I know I'm not going to beg anymore. This is it. Say the word, and I'll walk away."

I took a deep breath and closed my eyes momentarily. I hadn't had any of that planned, and I didn't have any idea what I was saying even as I was speaking the words. But I meant all of it, every word. And so much was depending on it.

_So _much.

I couldn't read her expression as we stood there, as much as I looked in to her eyes…those green eyes. I never knew what they were saying.

So I just had to guess. And really, _really_ hope.

I took a step closer to her, my pulse racing. She backed up against the wall behind her, a breath catching in her throat. I stepped towards her, putting my huge hands flat on the wall either side of her head and looked in to her eyes once more, our noses almost touching.

Lily kept her palms flat on the wall but didn't push me away. We stared at each other for a long moment - before something suddenly snapped.

Lily wrapped her arms around my neck and just like last time, we were kissing before I knew what was happening, kissing like a moment hadn't passed since our first kiss by the lake. I knew everything I'd done was forgiven and forgotten as I pulled her away from the wall and wrapped my arms around her waist, pulling her close to me.

I ran my tongue along her bottom lip, and her mouth opened and her breath mingled with my own. I was only half aware of what I was doing as I lifted her up and span around, kicking a chair aside and putting her down on to a writing desk. She wrapped her legs around my waist immediately, pulling me to her and ran her fingers through my hair.

Forgetting momentarily about the reason for being in the common room in the first place, I slipped one of my huge hands under her jumper and ran it up her bare back. She shuddered at my touch.

"Oh, I _hate_ you James," she muttered, hardly taking her lips away from my own.

"I love you too, Lils."

She froze as she registered what I'd just said. I was still registering it myself.

"You…love me?"

I paused for a moment before I realised what an obvious answer it was. "Of course. Would I have gone through all of this if I hadn't? I love you, Lily."

"Well…" she began, a small smile on her face. "I – ditto."

"Ditto? That's all I get?" I said, pulling back a little. "Come on, Lils. You can say it now. You've pretty much admitted it. Just say it!"

"No!"

"Come on!"

"No!"

"Why must you always argue with me?" I said, smiling.

"Okay, fine. I love you, James. I love you, I love you, I love you. Happy now?"

"Extremely," I beamed.

"Now, will you shut up and kiss me again?"

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**A/N There you go! They've made up :) That chapter took me a ridiculous amount of time, considering the fact that it's rather short. The story could end here, but I definitely want to do at least one more chapter. So don't fear, another chapter will soon be here…haha, poor Jam Pot and his lame lines. Oh, yeah I kinda copied the 'ditto' thing from '_Ghost_'. Love that movie, and I thought it fitted with James and Lily nicely.  
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**I really need to stop writing essays for ANs. Anyway, one last thing, please leave a review, because they'll definitely encourage me to update faster...only 6 reviews until 100! **


	16. Our Sofa

Chapter 16 – Our Sofa

"Lily," I began, reluctantly pulling away. "I have something to tell you."

"Oh, Merlin," she replied. She sat down on the sofa, and I immediately sat down next to her. "You're not going to tell me that you've decided you don't like me so much, after all this time, are you?"

I chuckled at the thought, and how completely impossible it was. "No, I'm not."

"Good. Because then I'd have to hit you, Jam Pot."

"Please, don't. Can I tell you now?"

"Go on, then."

"It was Sirius who stole the Deflating Draught," I gabbled quickly, biting my lip after I'd finished, gauging her reaction.

Her nostrils flared and she stared at me icily. "Go on."

"I didn't know, I swear. He only told me when we were leaving the classroom. I know where it is, and I was going to go get it if you weren't going to listen to me, and – "

"Stop," she interrupted, putting her hand over my mouth. She nearly broke my nose. "It's okay. As long as you weren't involved, it's fine with me. I suppose I'll have to accept that you have an idiotic friend. And I guess I should thank him, too."

I breathed a sigh of relief. "You have no idea how hard it was to tell you that. I thought you were going to run again."

"I've had enough of running. That, and I really, really want to stay. Like I said James, I…love you."

I smiled at hearing her say the words again, and kissed her softly on the lips, just for a split-second. "I love you too."

"So, where's the potion?" Lily asked.

"Oh, yeah. I'll go get it."

I ran towards the stairs to the dormitory, looking back at Lily as I leapt up them two at a time. I almost fell flat on my face as I did so, and I heard a small tinkling laugh as I scrambled up the last few stairs.

I was surprised to see the dormitory door wide open, but I realised Sirius must have left it that way. I peered in his open wardrobe impatiently, not wanting to spend too much time apart from Lily. I was so happy, so ecstatic that Lily and I were finally together, that I almost didn't notice the small note next to the flask. I saw it just as I was about to shut the door, and it caught my attention as I saw it said James on the outside. Remembering what had happened last time after I'd picked up something just because it had my name on, I almost left it where it was. But I realised that this was actually addressed to me, so I had every right to read it. I unfolded it (with great difficulty) and read Sirius' familiar writing.

I told you so. Have fun today.

I laughed. I realised there was no doubt in his mind that his plan wouldn't work, or else he wouldn't have written the note. I realised he was going to milk it for all it was worth, and I knew he'd be expecting a 'thank you' daily until Christmas.

I bounded back down the stairs, the flask in my robe pocket. I jumped the last five stairs, landing on the carpet with a thud. Lily snapped her head up in surprise, looking at me with an alarmed look on her face.

"Calm down, James. We have all day," she reminded me. I smiled at the thought of spending the entire day with her. Of course, we could go back to classes after using the potion, but… would we _really _want to do that?

I pulled the potion carefully out of my pocket. "What do we even do with it?"

"I think you just…drink it?" Lily replied uncertainly.

I knew there was no way I could open the flask using my hands, so I prised the lid off using my teeth. I dropped it on the ground before peering inside the flask.

"I'll go first then, shall I?" I said nervously, lifting it to my lips. I took a sip, and almost gagged. It tasted disgusting.

I handed it to Lily, wiping my mouth. She swallowed some and wrinkled up her nose before turning to me. "That stuff is vile."

I nodded in agreement, and looked down at my hands. They were shrinking before my eyes, and were back to their normal size within seconds.

Lily breathed a sigh of relief after her hands returned to normal, a spilt second after my own. I put my arm around her, and she slid nearer to me on the sofa.

"What do you want to do today, then?" I asked, taking her hand.

"I don't know. We should really go back to class," Lily stated unhappily.

"We _should_, but we won't. Besides, that would just get Sirius in trouble. The teachers would know he stole the potion if we came back to class with hands that are suddenly a normal size. People notice things like that, you know," I teased.

"I guess I'll just have to spend the whole day alone with you then, Potter," Lily sighed in mock discomfort.

"Oh, will it be too much of a trauma for you, Lils?"

"I suppose I'll get through it," she grumbled. "If I _have _to."

"Yep, you have too. I'm not letting you leave."

To demonstrate that, I put both arms around her waist tightly and pulled her on to my lap. She laughed and leaned in to kiss me. I put one of my hands in her hair as we kissed and –

Sirius has the worst timing.

"Oh, so I _am _interrupting," he said happily, clambering through the portrait hole. "I really did hope so."

Lily groaned and rolled off my lap, on to the sofa. "Yes, you are Black. Kindly go away."

"Yeah. What Lily said," I added.

"Hey, now. Why the hostility?" Sirius grinned. "Congrats, by the way. And thanks, Evans. James might finally stop talking about you now."

"Come on, Sirius," said Remus, who was standing beside Sirius. I hadn't noticed him come in, but he was standing there with a huge smile on his face. "Let's leave them to it."

"Okay," he grumbled. "But they haven't even said thank you yet! Even you have to admit how great my plan was, Remus. Maybe I should become a matchmaker or something. It's about time you went on a date again. It's been, what, a year? Maybe I could set you up with one of Charlotte's friends. Oh, you could start dating MaryMcKinnon, she's bookish like you, but she's pretty good looking as well, and…"

Sirius' voice faded as he followed Remus out of the portrait hole, winking at us once before he did so.

"Where were we?" said Lily, watching Sirius disappear with a roll of her eyes.

In answer to her question, I began to kiss her again.

.x.

About half an hour later, we hadn't moved off the sofa. Lily was resting her head on my shoulder and I was stroking her hair as we spoke quietly.

"Oh, Lils. I have something I have to ask you."

"What is it?"

"Will you come to Hogsmeade with me this Saturday?"

She laughed softly. "I've lost count of the number of times you've asked me that question."

"But this time, there's actually a hope you might say yes. How about it?"

"It's a date," she replied, emphasising each word as she spoke them.

"You have no idea how long I've been waiting to hear you say that," I said, grinning. It was quite ridiculous how happy I was to hear the words, considering she'd already said she loved me, and snogged me rather senseless.

"You have no idea how weird it feels to be _saying _it. If you told me ten days ago that I'd be going on a date with James Potter, I would've laughed in your face."

"Aw, thank you Lily. You always say such nice things," I joked.

"I love you; that's nice."

"I love you too."

.x.

It was with deep regret that I walked up the dormitory stairs that evening. Admittedly, it was past midnight, but I still hadn't spent enough time in the common room with Lily. I craved her company – her laugh was infectious, her smile addicting. I spent the entire day with her, and part of the night. We skipped lunch altogether, leaving it completely unmentioned until my stomach's rumblings reminded us that we hadn't eaten since breakfast. It was four o'clock by this time though – far too late for lunch, but too early for dinner. Not that I minded – Lily came before treacle tart any day.

Professor Dent sent a stammering second year boy with the freshly made Deflating Draught at around seven o'clock. The boy peered at us, trying to figure out what needed deflating.

We received many curious stares as people began to enter the common room after classes. That was nothing, though, compared to the silence that fell when we entered the Great Hall, hand in hand, for dinner. It had taken a lot of persuading from Sirius, Remus, Peter, Alice (who had squealed when she walked in to the common room in the lunch hour and spotted Lily and I holding hands on the sofa, before shooting Lily a stare that even I could tell meant 'tell me _everything_ later') and Frank to convince us to come to dinner at all.

"Okay, nothing to see here, folks!" Sirius called as we walked down the space between the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff tables. "Just a girl who usually throws food at her admirer, finally getting together with him. But come on! We all knew it was going to happen!"

At his words, I just couldn't resist…the looks on people's faces would be priceless…I put my arm around Lily's waist and bent her gently backwards before lowering my lips to hers, kissing her like there was no tomorrow.

Cheers erupted from the Gryffindor, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff tables, as if we were performing the final scene in a play – which I suppose we were, in a way. We'd got our happily ever after.

I slowly pulled away after a couple of long moments. Even Professor Dumbledore was clapping good-naturedly, a twinkle in his eyes. I took Lily's hand and pulled her down on to an empty bench and sat next to her.

"Oh, James," scolded Alice, who had just sat down between Remus and Frank. "You're such a show off."

"Some things never change," Lily said, trying to sound stern – but her smile gave her away

"Sorry," I whispered softly in her ear, her red hair tickling my nose. "That was sort of stupid."

"It can't be that stupid, if I enjoyed it so much," she whispered back, smiling. That addicting smile again.

"Oy! You two! We're trying to eat here!" yelled Sirius with a grin. "Are you trying to make us feel sick?"

"Ah, sorry mate. Can't help it, though. I'm so happy."

Sirius rolled his eyes and returned to his food.

Everyone hastily excused themselves when we returned to the common room, leaving Lily and I alone on the sofa. It was quickly becoming _our _sofa, and that's where we stayed until Lily unhappily insisted that she really had to get some sleep.

We said goodnight (both verbally _and _physically) before walking up our respective staircase to our dormitory.

I lay in bed feeling so much happier than the previous night, it was hard to believe I was the same person.

Lily and I were finally together. Hopefully, together forever – or, forever and a day as I'd told Lily a couple of hours before, which resulted in her calling me a 'soppy prat'.

I suppose some things never change.

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**A/N There you have it – the final chapter. I hope you enjoyed it, and didn't choke on all the fluff :) I was amazed at getting twelve reviews last chapter, it was the most I've received the whole story…so far (hint hint!) Thank you so much to everyone who's ever reviewed and added this to their alerts or favourites, it really means a lot to me when I find the messages in my inbox! Sorry I took a while to update _again…_stupid French coursework keeping me busy.**

**This was my first fan fiction, and I've really, really enjoyed writing it, so there's a fairly good chance I might write a sequel in a few months…good idea? Bad idea? Let me know! **

**Big hugs to everyone, thanks so much, and please leave a last review!**


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